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A massive 2,492-carat diamond, the world’s second-largest, has been found in Botswana, the Canadian mining company that discovered the diamond announced Thursday.
Lucara Diamonds said in a statement that the diamond was discovered using X-ray detection technology at the Karowe diamond mine in northeastern Botswana.
Lucara did not provide an estimate for the diamond, which is second only to the 3,106-carat Cullinan diamond discovered in South Africa in 1905.
“We are extremely excited about the discovery of this extraordinary 2,492 carat diamond,” Lucara President William Lamb said in the statement.
The discovery is “one of the largest rough diamonds ever unearthed,” the statement said, and was tested using the company’s giant diamond recovery X-ray technology installed in 2017 to identify and preserve large, high-value diamonds.
The palm-sized translucent stone was presented to President Mokgweetsi Masisi in his office late on Thursday by Naseem Lahri, managing director of Lukla Botswana.
“I heard this is the largest diamond ever found in Botswana and the second largest in the world,” Masisi congratulated the company on its find. “It is so precious.”
Botswana is one of the world’s largest diamond producers, with diamonds being its main source of revenue, accounting for 30 percent of its gross domestic product and 80 percent of its exports, according to the International Monetary Fund.
The arid, sparsely populated country, with a population of about 2.5 million, was extremely poor when it gained independence from Britain in 1966.
A year later, diamonds were discovered in the country, which is now the world’s largest diamond producer, according to the IMF.
Lucara said it would pay the government a 10% royalty on all sales of diamonds from Karowe, whether they are rough or polished.
“With this huge diamond, I can see that the road is being built,” Masisi said as he posed with the giant diamond.
– ‘Maybe we’ll see more’
Tobias Kormind, managing director of 77 Diamonds, Europe’s largest online diamond jeweller, confirmed it was the largest rough diamond ever unearthed since the Cullinan diamond, part of which adorns Britain’s crown jewels.
“This discovery is largely thanks to new technology that is able to extract larger diamonds from the ground without breaking them into pieces. As a result, we are likely to discover more sources of diamonds,” he said.
Prior to Thursday’s announcement, the largest diamond ever found in Botswana was a 1,758-carat diamond mined by Lucara at the Karowe mine in 2019 called Sewelo.
In 2021, Lucara used the same X-ray technology to discover a 1,174-carat diamond in Botswana.
The mine began production in 2012 and has since sold 216 diamonds for more than $1 million each, and more than 11 individual diamonds for more than $10 million each.
The diamond mining industry has been hit hard by lab-grown diamonds and weak consumption.
“Diamond prices are going through difficult times right now,” Masisi said.
“But every diamond is precious and worth a lot of money. We have to optimize and get the best price for this diamond.”
According to the Financial Times, anonymous sources at Lucara estimated that the gem could be worth more than $40 million.
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