Things were much calmer in the global trade when World Federation of Diamond Bourses (WFDB) president Yoram Dvash sat down for an interview with Rapaport News on March 11. Dealers had just returned from a positive Hong Kong show. The European Union had recently delayed its traceability rules for enforcing Russia sanctions until January 2026. The rough and polished markets were showing signs of recovery.
That changed, however, on April 2, when US President Donald Trump announced tariffs on almost all imports, including diamonds and jewelry. The topics Dvash discussed with this reporter — the Russia sanctions, category marketing, arbitration — took a back seat. The only thing anyone was talking about was how the new customs duties would affect the industry.
“The issue of Russian sanctions has not disappeared, but the tariffs issue naturally is the focus of attention now,” Dvash said Monday in an emailed response to follow-up questions.
Tariff tiff
Dvash’s publicity during that crisis was probably not what he wanted. On April 7, the Israel Diamond Exchange (IDE) resigned its membership in the WFDB amid a highly political disagreement, partly about the response to the tariffs. The IDE will focus its attention on the World Diamond Council (WDC) and the International Diamond Manufacturers Association (IDMA), which it viewed as the “leading global bodies in the industry,” according to a letter the IDE wrote to the WFDB. Dvash said the move was “unexpected and rash.”
On Monday, the WFDB said it hoped the decision was not final. IDE president Nissim Zuaretz told Rapaport News the organization was considering rejoining the federation if it’s the right decision for the industry and said negotiations were ongoing.
The row highlighted the challenge that comes from the multiplicity of trade groups operating in the diamond industry and the lack of clarity about who represents the global trade. One of the sources of disagreement, on the surface, was who was claiming to be in charge of the response to the tariffs. “The question is not who leads but what we achieve,” Dvash said at the time.
June meeting
The federation has continued to work on a response to the tariffs, conducting discussions among members and with other industry organizations in search of a “united strategy,” Dvash said. “There have been several Zoom meetings, and we will continue to meet to work together to further this effort,” he continued.
It has also updated the theme of the upcoming Presidents’ Meeting, which will take place in New York on June 10 and 11. Timed so people can attend after the JCK Las Vegas show, the annual conference will now include a panel event about tariffs as well as closed meetings for discussions about strategy for dealing with the issue.
The new topic of the conference is “Natural Diamonds: Tariffs and Creating Demand.” Planned speakers include Diamantino Azevedo, Angola’s minister of mineral resources, petroleum and gas, as well as Rapaport Group Chairman Martin Rapaport. The WFDB hopes representives from the US administration will also come to share their perspectives.
Three-part role
Founded in 1947, the WFDB represents the world’s diamond-trading community, with its members spanning 27 bourses and encompassing almost 30,000 people. The participating bourses pay membership fees.
While the existence of many trade bodies creates confusion and overlap, Dvash defined the WFDB’s role in three clear parts.
The first is promoting natural diamonds. To this end, the federation released the first in a series of marketing videos on April 2 on its Instagram profile, focusing on the “realness” of mined diamonds. (It was previously planning a YouTube campaign but decided Instagram would be a better platform for reaching younger consumers.) It intends to release at least five more videos by the end of the year, Dvash said.
“We’ve got very good feedback from our bourses and from the public,” said Dvash. “We are now collecting figures on level of engagement, and we will learn from them.”
This raises the question of how the WFDB’s work interacts with that of the Natural Diamond Council (NDC), the industry’s main creator of category advertising. Two years ago, the WFDB announced a partnership with the NDC involving a financial investment and collaboration.
Dvash acknowledged there’s an argument for gathering all the available funding in one place rather than the WFDB investing in its own category marketing. This is why it also gave money to the NDC, he said.
“In the end, when we give money, we have no control over it,” said Dvash in the March interview. “We thought we could leverage our members. And I don’t think you always have to put everything in one place. Of course we support [NDC CEO] David Kellie. He will be an honored guest at the Presidents’ Meeting. But we don’t always support [the idea] that there should be just one voice in the industry.”
De Beers carries out marketing with and without the NDC as well, Dvash pointed out.
“We also saw the value of utilizing the WFDB’s unique infrastructure to run a parallel effort focused on grassroots impact,” he said.
Sanctions and disputes
The WFDB’s second role of late has been to help diamantaires carry out business despite the challenges that import restrictions on Russian diamonds have created. “The sanctions against Russian diamonds — we don’t have any opposition to those. The problem is that the governments have imposed sanctions that also affect diamonds from Botswana, from Namibia, from other countries — very legitimate diamonds.”
The third, Dvash explained, is facilitating international arbitration between member bourses or between their individual members. “The fact that there is an option for arbitration prevents a lot of problems and difficulties” — a privilege that does not exist in other industries, Dvash argued.
The members manage to work together on these issues even as their interests often conflict and despite the fact lab-grown diamond companies are among its members. “We, the federation, remember that synthetics producers are, after all, bourse members. Therefore, the campaigns we release are not against synthetics…but are in support of natural diamonds.”
Market slowdown
The WFDB’s members are generally in a tougher spot than a month ago. Trading outside the US has weakened, and inventory has shifted from overseas to America as companies tried to beat the early-April tariff deadline.
“The tariffs have not yet affected trading within the US,” said Dvash on Monday. “Of course, there is a slowdown in international trading as there is a high level of uncertainty in the markets.”
Image: Yoram Dvash. (Gil Lavi)
