Executive summary
Natural diamonds remain geologically scarce, but scarcity no longer guarantees commercial power. Synthetic diamonds can reproduce the same physical product at a falling cost, weakening the link between rarity and price on which producing countries, such as Botswana and Angola, have long depended.
The scale of substitution is already striking. More than 50% of US engagement rings, when sold by volume, now feature laboratory/lab-grown diamonds, according to industry representatives (CIBJO, 2026a). Yet natural diamonds still account for most market value: De Beers estimates that they represented 75% of overall US diamond demand by value in 2025 and 85% of sales value among independent jewellers (De Beers, 2026a).
That distinction suggests a strategy. Botswana and Angola should not try to beat synthetics in the mass market. Their opportunity is to make natural diamonds a deliberately separate luxury category built around rarity, provenance and verifiable origin.
Introduction
During President Duma Boko’s September visit to Angola, Boko called synthetic stones “fake”, while Angolan President João Lourenço argued that the natural-diamond industry needed protection from cheaper laboratory-produced alternatives. Both governments announced closer cooperation on natural diamonds and stressed their importance for employment, revenue and development (CIPRA, 2026a).
The Confédération Internationale de la Bijouterie, Joaillerie, Orfèvrerie des Diamants, Perles et Pierres (CIBJO), in English the World Jewellery Confederation, recently introduced a new terminology which distinguishes natural from synthetic diamonds, even though synthetic stones have essentially the same chemical composition, physical properties and structure as their naturally occurring equivalents. On 7 September, its board recommended “synthetic” as the sole international descriptor rather than the more market-friendly “laboratory-grown” or “laboratory-created” (CIBJO, 2026b).
But beneath this rhetoric conflict lies a more serious economic problem. Synthetic production has weakened what made diamonds unusual among commodities: scarcity itself once supported value. Academic work on the historical diamond market shows how De Beers reinforced geological scarcity institutionally, controlling the flow of rough stones, holding inventories and investing heavily in demand creation (Spar, 2006; Bergenstock, Deily and Taylor, 2006).
Synthetic diamonds break this mechanism. Supply is technologically reproducible and wholesale prices can continue falling towards production costs. Natural producers cannot restore the old market simply by reminding consumers that mined stones are scarce.
They must instead make origin itself scarce.
Analysis
This is why Botswana and Angola’s interest in De Beers matters far more than the dispute over terminology.
Anglo-American owns 85% of De Beers, while Botswana already holds 15%. Anglo is seeking to exit the business following prolonged market weakness, and Botswana has been considering whether to exercise its pre-emption rights, join another buyer or participate in a broader consortium (Anglo American, 2026; Reuters, 2026a). Angola has separately sought a 20–30% stake and, during Boko’s visit, Lourenço explicitly linked producer ownership of De Beers to greater influence over both production and, crucially, commercialisation (Reuters, 2026b; CIPRA, 2026a).
That could change the policy from defensive marketing into something closer to market architecture.
De Beers is not, in fact, merely a mining company, as it operates across rough-diamond sales, branding, retail, traceability and consumer marketing. Producer-state equity would therefore give Botswana and Angola influence over the institution that historically helped define what a diamond means to consumers.
The opportunity is to formalise segmentation. Rather than competing against a much cheaper synthetic equivalent, natural diamonds could increasingly be sold as authenticated geological assets with documented origin, finite supply and a development story. De Beers’ Tracr platform already provides country-of-origin information for qualifying stones, while its recent strategy has placed greater emphasis on provenance and natural-diamond marketing (De Beers, 2026b).
The World Jewellery Confederation found that, as of today, by volume, half of the engagement rings acquired in the United States contain a lab-grown diamond (CIBJO, 2026a), showing that this separation may already be emerging. Synthetics have captured enormous volume, although natural diamonds still retain disproportionate value. The figures are confirmed by independent market data. BriteCo’s 2026 index, based on jewellery appraisals across all 50 US states, found that lab-grown stones accounted for 51% of newly appraised engagement rings in the first half of 2026, up from just 5.9% in 2019. Over the same period, the median price per carat was $2,015 for lab-grown diamonds against $8,703 for natural stones, illustrating both the speed of adoption and the widening price gap between the two markets (BriteCo, 2026).
There is a danger, however, in confusing strategic importance with a good investment.
If producer governments acquire De Beers primarily to prevent prices falling, they risk transferring commercial losses from a multinational company to public balance sheets. They would effectively be buying exposure to the disruption they are trying to resist. It is important to note that parts of the economies of Angola and Botswana still rely substantially on international loans from major financial institutions, which in return ask for social reforms and responsible public debt management. In particular, the IMF has explicitly cautioned Botswana against increasing its stake in De Beers given the country’s fiscal position and already high dependence on diamonds; the sector accounted for around 80% of exports between 2012 and 2023 and roughly two-thirds in 2024 (IMF, 2025).
Any acquisition should therefore be judged less by how much production governments can control and more by what commercial capabilities ownership provides.
Conclusion
A producer coalition involving Botswana, Angola and potentially other African diamond states could retain professional private management while using shareholder influence to strengthen provenance standards, coordinate category marketing and build clearer separation between natural and synthetic products. Public financial exposure should remain limited, transparent and tied to a credible commercial plan.
Surely, the strategy cannot depend on claims that synthetic diamonds are “fake”. That argument is technically weak and potentially also undermines consumer trust. The stronger claim is also the truthful one: the products may be physically similar, but their origin, scarcity and economic meaning are fundamentally different.
The lab-grown revolution means Botswana and Angola cannot recreate the diamond market of the twentieth century. Nor should they try. What they can attempt to recreate is the premium that scarcity once produced automatically, through a balanced strategy of acquisition, marketing and expansion.
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