In an interview with Kommersant, quoted in Rough & Polished, Alrosa President Sergey Ivanov said that the Russian mining giant does not intend to reduce production in the next five years.
Ivanov added that Alrosa will not follow De Beers’ example, who has cut sales to maintain diamond prices, and said: “Based on the current state of the world’s diamond production capacity and growth in demand, we are confident that in the next five years or so we will not face the need to reduce production volumes. If we reduce production … costs will immediately grow”. He also said that due to “technical factors”, Alrosa will not increase production either, and that the miner’s production “will fluctuate in the range of 37-38 million carats a year” in the coming years.
In a recent Q4 and FY 2017 performance report, Alrosa announced that its diamond production for 2017 totaled 39.6 million carats – up 6% year-on-year. Rough diamond sales in the 4th quarter totaled 9.4 million carats.
