- Mr Fabio Cascapera – President Diamond Exchange of Singapore
- His Excellency the Honorable Dr Janio Da Rosa Correa Victor
- Secretary of State for Mineral Resources, Government of Angola
- The Honorable Bogolo Joy Kenewendo – Minister of Minerals and Energy, Botswana
- Mr. Yoram Dvash – President of the World Federation of Diamond Bourses
- Your excellencies – distinguished guests – ladies and gentlemen,
It is an absolute honor to welcome you all on IDMA’s behalf to the 41st World Diamond Congress.
Before we begin our deliberations, I must take a moment to express our immense gratitude to our host country, Singapore.
Known as a global crossroads, Singapore perfectly mirrors the spirit of our industry, a place where brilliance, precision, and global connection come together.
Thank you to our hosts for welcoming us with such warmth and setting the perfect stage for a sparkling week ahead.
We are incredibly grateful for the hospitality of our Singaporean hosts, whose worldclass environment inspires the forward-thinking discussions we aim to have this week.
Good morning everyone.
I want to ask you a question. What do you desire?
Think about it for a moment.
Not what do you need.
What do you want?
For me, it’s cars, motorcycles and watches.
I love cars. I love motorcycles and I love watches.
I don’t need another one.
My wife Lynn definitely thinks I don’t need another one. But I still find myself looking at them.
Reading about them.
Thinking about them.
Maybe for you it’s something else.
A watch.
A boat.
A vacation.
A great bottle of wine.
Whatever it is, you may want it.
But the reality is, and it hurts to say this, you don’t need it.
Yet you still want it.
And that’s an important distinction.
Because nobody builds a luxury industry around need.
Luxury is built on desire.
For generations, natural diamonds were among the most desired products in the world.
People dreamed about them.
People celebrated life’s most important moments with them.
A natural diamond meant something.
It represented love.
Commitment.
Achievement.
Success.
It was never just a product.
So I think we need to ask ourselves a difficult question.
If we have such a remarkable product, why is business so difficult?
Over the past twenty years our industry has worked incredibly hard.
We have improved standards.
We have strengthened consumer confidence.
We have invested in technology.
We have done important work to protect the integrity of our product.
And we should be proud of that.
But let’s be honest with ourselves.
Somewhere along the way we forgot how to create desire.
We became focused on explaining natural diamonds.
We became focused on defending natural diamonds.
We became focused on proving what natural diamonds are.
What we stopped doing was making people want them. That is the challenge.
Not because there is anything wrong with the product.
There isn’t.
Natural diamonds remain one of the most extraordinary products in the world.
The challenge is that we stopped telling the story in a way that creates desire.
We stopped making consumers dream.
The good news is that nothing about the product has changed.
Natural diamonds are still rare.
They are still finite.
They are still products of nature.
They still carry a story unlike any other product on earth.
The opportunity is still there.
We simply have to reconnect consumers with that story.
As President of IDMA and the World Diamond Council, I have tried to keep our mission very simple.
If what we are doing is not helping this industry sell natural diamonds, we should ask ourselves why we are doing it.
That doesn’t mean standards don’t matter.
They do.
It doesn’t mean consumer confidence doesn’t matter.
It does.
It doesn’t mean the Kimberley Process doesn’t matter.
It absolutely does.
But all of those things are a means to an end.
The end is a healthy, growing natural diamond industry.
The end is helping this industry sell diamonds.
The end is consumers choosing natural diamonds.
That is why I have been talking about One Voice for Natural Diamonds and why I have repeatedly asked the question, “Why?” My answer is always the same.
Because we are all in it together.
But if we are going to speak with one voice, we must also remember what the World Diamond Council is, and what it is not.
We are an apolitical industry organisation. We do not represent governments. We represent the businesses and industry associations that make up the global natural diamond trade. Our responsibility is to bring that trade together in support of responsible business, constructive dialogue and confidence in natural diamonds. That responsibility requires us to apply our principles fairly, consistently and without political bias. We will not always agree on every issue beyond our trade. Nor should we expect to. What unites us is something much more important: a shared belief in the future of natural diamonds and a shared responsibility to support the industry that provides livelihoods for millions of people around the world.
Because consumers do not care about the boundaries between miners, manufacturers, traders and retailers.
They see one product.
And they hear one story.
Or they don’t.
The future of our industry will not be decided in conference rooms.
It will be decided by consumers.
By whether consumers want natural diamonds.
That is our challenge.
The want.
The desire for natural diamonds.
To make consumers want natural diamonds again.
To make them desire natural diamonds again.
If we do that, everything else takes care of itself.
On that subject, IDMA will be presenting what I believe will be one of the most timely discussions of this Congress: “From Defence to Offence: Winning the Consumer Conversation in the Last 18 Inches.”
We often hear that natural diamonds have lost significant market share to synthetics. Whether you focus on the exact percentage or not, the challenge before us is undeniable. The question is no longer whether we need to win back consumers. The question is how.
Three well-known industry figures – John Pollard of IGI, Beth West of the De Beers, and Jacqu Voorhees, founder of Polygon and CEO of IceCap.AI, have put together a strategy how we can win this battle! This exciting panel is not just ideas, it is a plan!
It is a conversation every one of us should be part of.
I hope you’ll join us on Tuesday, 14 July at 4:10 pm.
Thank you.
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