2027 Agenda

Have diamonds become a luxury brand rather than a mining commodity?

Natural diamond producers once benefited from a tightly controlled supply chain and a powerful global narrative built around rarity and desirability. Today, prolonged pressure from lab-grown diamonds, changing consumer behaviour and weak demand has contributed to a sustained downturn in natural diamond prices, with several mines reducing or suspending production through 2026. If value is increasingly created through branding, provenance and consumer trust rather than extraction alone, where does that leave the mining companies? What producers can do to rebuild pricing power, or must producers rethink where and how value is captured?

The big questions

• Does the scarcity of natural diamonds alone will support price recovery or is it time to re-think the business model?
• Should mining companies themselves be more involved in marketing of natural diamonds?
• Should miners move further downstream into branding, retail and direct consumer engagement or leave that to the jewellery industry?
• What partnerships could help rebuild demand?