“The hurricanes, Katrina and Rita, aren’t going to make a significant impact on diamond jewellery consumption, but it is the high oil prices that may have an impact,” said Varda Shine, DTC Managing Director-designate. De Beers reported an 8 % rise in rough diamond sales in first half to $3.2 billion due to rises in prices and strong demand. Rough diamond sales in 2004 were $5.7 billion.

DE BEERS aims to raise core earnings to $2 billion annually by 2009 by stimulating demand and pushing up prices. DTC will boost worldwide demand for diamonds by continuing its aggressive marketing efforts. De Beers’ target is to raise growth in demand to around 5% annually from an average of 3.2% per annum over the past five years.

“We’ve now put ourselves a real stretch target of 5% annual growth in our business, which is going to be a challenge for us to meet,” said DTC Managing Director Gareth Penny. The US sales in the second half of 2005 could be lower than those in the first six months of the year primarily due to weak sales at the lower end of the market, such as at WalMart, the largest retailer of diamond jewellery in the US.