The giant pit at Jwaneng – the name means “place of little stones” – is the world’s most lucrative diamond mine. On the southern fringes of the Kalahari desert to the west of Gaborone, it yields about as much by carat weight as all the mines of South Africa, once the great power of the diamond industry, and most of the stones it produces are gem-quality. The terraced cavity is already a vertiginous 326 metres deep and the digging is still going on. But mine managers say production has probably peaked, and that in eight to 10 years the operation will have to move from open-pit to more expensive underground mining.
Botswana is the world’s leading source of diamonds by value, and second only to Australia by volume. But output from its four active mines, all run by Debswana, the De Beers group’s 50-50 joint venture with the government, is expected to level off over the next five years, after edging up to a record 31.9m carats last year.
