De Beers to Suspend Production at Venetia Mine

De Beers will pause production at its Venetia mine in South Africa for two years in a fresh cost-cutting drive that reflects the market’s shift to higher-value diamonds.

“The changes we are making to our business are focused on underpinning our efficiency now and into the future, favorably positioning De Beers in its leadership role,” De Beers CEO Al Cook said in a statement Monday.

The move comes amid parent company Anglo American’s efforts to sell De Beers and follows an ongoing downturn in the diamond market.

Venetia’s smaller, lower-value goods have been among the worst hit. Sales at De Beers’ South Africa business – which has just the one mine – averaged $66 per carat last year, compared with $110 per carat for Botswana and $353 per carat for Namibian deposits, according to Anglo American.

“We recognize the protracted challenging conditions as the diamond industry evolves, though we are encouraged by signs of consumer demand growth in the US and beyond, particularly in higher-quality diamonds,” Cook added. “Global rough-diamond supply is falling, bringing more support to the market.”

De Beers will confirm the timeline of the suspension once it has completed a consultation process with employees. The company will also rephase its capital expenditure on the Venetia underground project, which opened in 2023 after an expansion that cost $2.3 billion. Open-pit mining ceased in 2022.

Earlier this year, De Beers paused the Tuzo Phase 3 expansion project at the Gahcho Kué mine in Canada, in a sign that De Beers’ operations were increasingly focusing on its higher-value sources in Botswana and Namibia.

In a letter to sightholders on Monday, De Beers’ executive vice president for trading, Paul Rowley, acknowledged that the decision might impact De Beers Sightholder Sales South Africa (DBSSSA), which oversees sales of rough for beneficiation in the country – meaning goods that remain in South Africa for cutting and polishing. “We will engage directly with DBSSSA sightholders to provide more information on what the intended changes will mean for beneficiation supply in South Africa in the second half of this year and beyond,” Rowley wrote.

De Beers will “look to remodel our production from across the wider De Beers Group portfolio to cover any shortfall in international supply arising from the intended pause at Venetia,” he continued.

De Beers also plans to refocus its global operating model on core businesses and reduce its central corporate cost base, the company said in a statement. Since 2024, the miner has reduced annual overheads by more than $100 million as part of its Origin strategy to concentrate on the parts of its business that create the most value. It has sold or closed noncore assets and restructured its capital expenditure and costs.

It has also invested in natural-diamond category marketing and noted a return to growth in global consumer demand for natural-diamond jewelry in 2025. Natural-diamond sales at US independent jewelers also increased in 2025 and in the first quarter of 2026, the company reported. Higher-value stones, including those that De Beers had promoted through its Desert diamonds marketing campaign, led this growth, it continued.

Meanwhile, global rough-diamond production is decreasing, with several producers closing mines during 2026, De Beers added.

“Whilst the increasing rarity of diamonds and the emerging signs of improvement in consumer demand are likely to support longer-term value creation, rough-diamond trading conditions are expected to remain challenging in the near term due to cyclical and industry-specific factors,” the company concluded.

Venetia yielded 740,000 carats in the first quarter of 2026, contributing around 10% of the company’s total.

De Beers’ production levels at other operations remain unchanged, as does its current production guidance of 21 million to 26 million carats in 2026.

Image: A shaft at De Beers’ Venetia underground mine in South Africa. (De Beers)