Sale of diamond jewellery jumps fivefold in two yrs

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In observance of Shab-e-Barat, BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia attended a khatme Quran, milad and dua mahfil after offering fateha at the mazar of late President Ziaur Rahman in the city Thursday night under the auspices of Nationalist Ulama Dal. — Focus Ba

Sonia H Moni
Sale of diamond jewellery jumped fivefold in the last two years in the country, thanks to skyrocketing gold price, change of people's taste and fast emergence an affluent class that considers wearing expensive gemstone as a symbol of social status.
Anwar Hossain, president of Bangladesh Jewellery Manufacturers and Exporters Association told the FE, "Diamond is a precious stone which is much prestigious but less heavier in weight than gold. Nowadays the country's women folk belonging to rich and upper middle class are inclined to buy diamond jewllery."
He said, "The yearly turnover of diamond jewellery is now worth around Tk 1.5 billion to 2.0 billion in comparison with Tk 200 million to Tk 300 million just two years back."
In the capital, there are a few diamond jewellery shops and most of the other shops sell gold and silver ornaments along with some diamond jewellery.
Meherunnahar who came to buy a diamond nose pin at Diamond World in Shoppers' World said, "I am getting married next month and for that reason I have come here to buy a nose pin and chain with diamond locket. Diamond is a dream for a woman."
"Once, the diamond was used by the rich but nowadays the precious stone has come within the reach of the upper middle class and middle class family as the price of diamond is not far from gold," Md Abu Syeed Managing Director of Royal Diamond told the FE. "Price of diamond jewellery depends on 4 Cs (cut, clarity, colour and carat). There are different colours of diamond like- white, yellow, pink and deep dark."
"Usually, we import diamond jewellery from India where the diamond jewellery is made up of white gold and platinum. India controls 90 per cent of the global market of the 'cut and polished' diamonds," he added.
"Any one can buy a nose pin at a cost of Tk 2000 to Tk 50,000, tops range from Tk 15,000 to Tk 100,000, ladies' ring sells at Tk 10,000 to Tk 100,000, only locket price ranges from Tk 8,000 to Tk 50,000 and locket set is priced at Tk 20,000 to Tk 70,000."
The international price of a 0.01 carat cut diamond with D-E-F colour and IF-VVS clarity is US$8.25 while the price of 0.01 carat cut diamond with M-N colour and I-P3 clarity is US$0.87.
Russia, South Africa, Angola, Sierra Leon, Namibia, Canada and Australia are the principal sources of rough diamonds, while India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Singapore are the major producers of the 'cut and polished' diamonds.
Vice president of Bangladesh Jewellers' Association MA Hannan Azad said: "The international price of diamond depends on colour under categories from D to N. D is the finest coloured white diamond. The clarity variation ranges from IF-VVS to I-P3. IF-VVS is the best quality diamond with clarity."
"Aside from all this quality the size of a diamond determines its price. A customer should know about all this things before buying diamond jewllery. The buyer should ask for the certificate for the diamond jewellery", he added.
The buyers should know about the moissanite stone which cannot be detected by the diamond selector, a diamond testing machine. People should buy diamond jewellery from well-known ornament shops so that they can test a diamond jewllery by both diamond selector and moissanite tester to evade cheating.
He urged the government to reduce the existing import tax on diamond from 63 per cent to 10 to 20 per cent so that diamond jewellery can be sold at a lower price. It will also discourage the customers to go abroad and buy diamond locally as they will get the quality and variety of diamond jewellery at an affordable cost.