Rough diamond prices to rise in 2011: De Beers

Rough diamond prices are likely to rise in 2011 on iniron ore mining process flow sheet designcreased demand from the biggest buyer, the United States, and as buying increases in India and China, the head of De Beers sales division said on Monday.

"We believe the price (for rough diamonds) will grow this year ... but not by the same level as we saw last year," Varda Shine, managing director of De Beers sales and marketing arm, the Diamond Trading Company, told Reuters in an interview. "The prices went up by 27 percent during 2010, it actually went down quite a lot in 2009," she added. De Beers controls around 40 percent of the rough or unpolished diamond market. Along with the rest of the sector, the company suffered during the global recession as consumers shied away from luxury goods, forcing it to temporarily close mines in the early part of 2009...