From January to May of this year, the country collected revenues estimated at 288 million dollars, with the sale of 2.5 million carats of diamonds produced by the Catoca, Luele and Lunhinga projects.

In five months, 4.2 million carats were recovered, 88 percent of which came from primary deposits and 12 percent from secondary deposits, which corresponds to 78 percent of the six-monthly plan being completed.

The data was revealed by the chairman of the Board of Directors of the National Diamond Company (ENDIAMA EP), Ganga Júnior, during a working meeting of the mineral resources, oil and gas sector, held in the country's capital, in which managers of public and private companies in the sector took an overview of the current situation with the head of Mirempet, Diamantino Azevedo.

Ganga Júnior recalled that the current moment is marked by low demand for diamonds on the international market due to geopolitical factors and the proliferation of synthetic diamonds, but reiterated the goal of reaching, by December of this year, a production of around 14.6 million carats, 88 percent of which comes from Catoca and Luele.

The process of partial privatization and dispersion of share capital, as the manager made known, is one of the priorities with a view to optimizing resources and efficiency, within the framework of reforms aimed at reducing State participation, promoting competition, competitiveness and efficiency.

According to the Chairman of the Board, the proposed terms of reference have already been submitted for approval, which contains all the details related to the structuring of the share dispersion program in BODIVA up to 30 percent of the share capital, an exercise that includes the preparation of documentation for hiring an international consultancy firm to support the integration into BODIVA.

The schedule presented by Ganga Júnior pointed out the actions aimed at the approval of the Partial Privatization Program and Organic Statute Proposal of ENDIAMA, SA, while on the 16th of this month of July the Limited Competition for the hiring of Consultancy will be opened, the analysis and approval of the result of which is scheduled for the 30th of September.

New projects

Among the actions aimed at increasing production levels, there is the application of 472 million dollars for geological-mining research activities, which includes nine projects in an advanced stage of prospecting, with the exception of Mulepe, which requested the termination of the CIM.

980 employees were hired, the majority of whom were nationals.

The Moquita Project will enter the production phase from the second half of this year, while Luachimba production will start in 2025”, he revealed.

Endiama, in alignment with the National Development Plan (PDN), has set a target of reaching production of around 17 million carats in 2027, with the Luele project supplying 43 percent of the total volume.

Projections indicate that 33 percent of carats will come from the Catoca project, with the sum of Catoca and Luele production accounting for 37 million carats of total production over the next 3 years, or 76 percent, while the remaining 13 percent will come from the Sangamina, Chiri, Mulepe, Cuango, Chitotolo and Somiluana projects.