Is Botswana Getting A Raw Deal From De Beers Diamonds - The World News !new!

Botswana is getting a raw deal not because of malice, but because the 50-year partnership was built for an era of stable growth and rising demand. That era is over. The country now faces the impossible task of trying to secure prosperity from a resource that is no longer as valuable, through a company that is losing money, all while trying to buy that same company for a price it can barely afford. The partnership that built Botswana into a success story may now be the very thing holding it back from its next stage of development.

In short, Gaborone wants to become Antwerp or Mumbai. It wants to process the diamonds where they are dug.

However, as the landmark 2011 sales agreement comes up for renegotiation, a critical question is echoing through Gaborone and global financial markets: Is Botswana actually getting a raw deal? Botswana is getting a raw deal not because

To understand the current friction, one must look at the current sales agreement, set to expire soon. The prevailing myth is that Botswana (through its state-owned entity, Okavango Diamond Company) and De Beers are equal partners—a 50/50 joint venture known as Debswana.

Botswana, a small landlocked country in Southern Africa, has been hailed as a success story in the diamond industry. The country's rich diamond deposits have made it one of the world's leading producers of the precious gemstone. However, recent developments have raised questions about whether Botswana is getting a fair deal from De Beers, the mining giant that has dominated the country's diamond industry for decades. The partnership that built Botswana into a success

However, critics argue that "production parity" does not equal "value parity." While Botswana gets half the rough diamonds, De Beers has historically controlled the pipeline : the sorting, valuing, marketing, and selling.

For decades, the sparkling relationship between the arid nation of Botswana and the diamond giant De Beers has been hailed as the "perfect marriage." Diamonds built Botswana’s middle class, funded its free education, and transformed it from one of the poorest countries on Earth into Africa’s most stable, upper-middle-income economy. However, as the landmark 2011 sales agreement comes

Counterarguments and mitigating factors