Russia Seeks to Boost Diamond Sales to Israel - Israeli Report
Posted on: Monday, 12 September 2005, 18:00 CDT
Text of report by Hadas Manor "Russia seeks closer diamond ties with Israel", carried in English by Israeli Globes business information website on 12 September
The Russian government wants to tighten ties with Israel's diamond industry, in order to boost sales of rough diamonds to Israel, and establish joint diamond polishing factories in Russia and third countries. Russia wants closer ties with Israel as an alternative to sales to De Beers Diamond Trading Company (De Beers). Sales could develop soon, if the European Competition Network (ECN) does not approve sales of rough diamonds by Russian state diamond company Alrosa to De Beers, because of the latter's market power in the EU.
The Russians informed International Diamond Manufacturers Association (IDMA) World Federation of Diamond Bourses (WFDB) president Shmuel Schnitzer and Israeli Diamond Manufacturers Association president Moti Ganz of their intentions during the latters' visit to Mirny, Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Siberia, last week. Ganz and Schnitzer were invited to attend Alrosa's 50th anniversary.
Russian Minister of Finance Aleksey Leonidovich Kudrin and Alrosa president Aleksander Nichiporuk hosted the event. Nichiporuk visited Israel in May as part of Russian Federation president Vladimir Putin and Sakha President Vyacheslav Anatoliyevich Shtyrov's entourage.
Ganz told "Globes", "The Russians warmly welcomed us, and told us that Russia was about to become the world's largest producer of rough diamonds, bigger than Botswana. Russia will produce 3bn dollars worth of diamonds, compared with Botswana's current output of over 2bn dollars. Russia will also soon change its method of selling rough diamonds, and tighten ties with the world's diamond industry, in order to build a different marketing model."
Russia produced 2.34bn dollars worth of diamonds in 2004, of which 1.16bn dollars was sold on the domestic market and 1.18bn dollars was exported. Some of the rough and polished diamonds sold in Russia's domestic market are exported to Israel and other diamond centres worldwide. Israeli diamond merchant Lev Leviev handles some of these sales.
Source: BBC Monitoring Newsfile
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