De Beers Group

De Beers is the largest diamond mining company in the world today, producing over 40% of global gem diamonds generated from our mines in Africa, as well as sorting and valuing two thirds of the world’s annual supply of rough diamonds.

De Beers employs about 24 000 people in 19 countries. This includes a multinational professional exploration team of over 200 earth scientists on 5 continents and in 13 countries, with over 25 joint venture exploration and evaluation projects with a number of companies in many parts of the world.

Also company have 20 mines currently in production in Africa and with expertise in every form of mining built up over more than a century. De Beers has the skills to surmount the formidable technical challenges that face us wherever we operate, from deep sea to alluvial and open pit.
Based in London, the Diamond Trading Company (DTC) is the rough diamond sales arm of the De Beers Group.

De Beers was established in 1888 and is the world’s leading diamond company with unrivalled expertise in exploration, mining and marketing of rough diamonds.

The history of De Beers falls into three broad stages:
- In its early years, when the company produced over 90% of the world’s diamonds, it was able to control the production and hence the supply of diamonds almost at will.
- Then, from the beginning of the 20th century, when rival producers began to challenge its pre-eminence, De Beers used its still-dominant position to co-ordinate and regulate the supply of diamonds in pursuit of price stability and consumer confidence.
- Finally, in the closing years of the last century, the globalising economy rendered De Beers’ role of industry custodian inappropriate and expensive. In response De Beers set about crafting a new strategy for the 21st century: a suite of innovative programmes and alliances designed to reinvigorate the industry and to grow demand for diamond jewellery.

It produces approximately 40% of the world’s supply of rough diamonds from its mines in South Africa, and in partnership with the governments of Botswana, Namibia and Tanzania.

Approximately 45% of the world’s rough diamond production (made up from diamonds from De Beers mines and those which De Beers purchases from Alrosa, the Russian state diamond mining company) are sorted and valued by the Diamond Trading Company, the sales and marketing arm of De Beers, headquartered in London.

De Beers and its partner companies employ more than 21,000 people in 25 countries on five continents. 17,000 of these are based in the southern African operations. De Beers has 15 mines across Africa and new mines are currently being built in Canada. The company has over a century of expertise in every form of mining (open pit, underground, alluvial, coastal and marine mining) as well as world-class skills in the sorting, valuing and marketing of diamonds.

In 2005 the De Beers Group generated US $6.5 billion in revenue and US$554 million in net earnings.
De Beers is committed to southern Africa and making a lasting contribution to the people of Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Tanzania. The company supports and encourages sustainable working to ensure long term positive outcomes for Africa and spends more than US $10 million per year on more than 600 Corporate Social Investment (CSI) activities globally.

The changing face of  De Beers In 2005, De Beers announced a groundbreaking Black Economic Empowerment deal with Ponahalo Investment which saw the sale of 26% of the equity of  De Beers Consolidated Mines (DBCM) to Ponahalo. The shareholders in Ponahalo represent the broadest possible cross-section of South African society. This sale is heralded to be a clear demonstration of  De Beers becoming a company that truly reflects the non-racial ideals of the government and citizens of South Africa.

Management systems and sustainable development of De Beers Group

The family of companies is committed to sustainable development as an integral part of the way we do business. This means ensuring that activities undertaken today meet the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It means ensuring our employees understand the long term economic, social and environmental implications of their decision-making.

To achieve these aims we engage constructively with our internal and external stakeholders and include their viewpoints and concerns as an integral part of our decision-making and as relevant and material to reporting. The Purpose, Vision, Values and Principles (PVVP) framework defines accountabilities across this range of issues and stakeholder concerns

De Beers Group is a privately owned company with three shareholders: