1. The impact of the economic crisis on the colored gems market
Although the jewelry market in China and India has maintained a strong growth, due to the impact of the world economic crisis, the import of jewelry products in developed countries such as the United States and Europe has fallen sharply, which makes the increase of jewelry market in China and India insufficient to make up for the shrinkage of developed countries' markets, and the total consumption of the world jewelry market has declined. Affected by this, colored gems's consumption has also declined, and Thailand's colored gems production and processing capacity in Taburi, Japp, Panyu, China, Huizhou and other processing zones have dropped significantly.
Non-ferrous gem miners are also affected by the rise in oil prices. They have to face the problems of rapidly rising mining costs and declining market demand, and some small miners are even forced to stop mining to reduce costs. These situations have formed a vicious circle in the supply chain.
2. The transformation of colored gems's raw ore mining mode.
Colored gems mainly comes from South America and Africa. Brazil is a traditional producer of colored gems, and its colored gems mining originated in the late 1960s. With the development of Brazil's economy, some rural workshop-style mining gradually disappeared, replaced by large-scale investment and high-tech support.
Africa is another supplier to colored gems. Some Brazilian miners and local African miners jointly develop mining areas and establish joint ventures. At present, some large companies, such as Jindi Company, have stable development projects in Africa, and maintain good cooperative relations with the local government to ensure long-term effective mining and establish smooth supply channels. At present, there is a trend that high-quality jadeite raw materials are gradually controlled by some companies with strong financial strength, clever marketing methods and huge advertising budget. For example, the Muzo Puerto Arturo mining area in Colombia has welcomed investment from the high-end retail sector. The investor controls 49% of the shares in the mining area and has control over the mining of the mining area. Another example is Tanzania's Tanzanite No.1 (South African listed company), a major Tanzanite supplier. The company also controls the mining right of green Cr-V-Ca-Al garnet through vertical combination. The above examples show that the joint merger and acquisition of upstream and downstream industries is the development trend of colored gems industries.
In Madagascar, the World Bank launched the "Capacity Building Project" in colored gems many years ago. At present, the World Bank also provides financial support to Nigeria, Tanzania and other non-ferrous gemstone producing countries in the world to promote the development of the whole link from raw material mining to marketing. In addition, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) also provides financial support to gem producing countries such as Pakistan and Afghanistan to promote mining, production and processing in mining areas. At present, the jadeite mining area in Panjshir Canyon and the lapis lazuli mining area in Baike Mountain have been funded by this organization.
The Mozambican government is planning to set up a jewelry training center to train talents in gem detection, classification and evaluation, so as to gradually reduce the quantity of low-priced gem raw materials exported at home and make the domestic jewelry industry develop in a healthy direction. The participation of the above-mentioned international organizations and governments will surely promote the faster and better development of the local colored gems industry and meet the demand of the jewelry market.
3. Supply situation of main producing areas in colored gems
Due to the economic crisis, Colombia's jadeite exports in 2009 decreased by 50% compared with 2008. The supply of emeralds in Brazil remains stable, and emeralds are traded frequently. This is largely due to the strong demand of Indian processing enterprises. Emerald mining areas in Brazil have also moved from the increasingly arid goias region to Bahia region. Emerald production in Zambia benefits from the orderly mining by Gemfields (London) Company. The company strictly controls the supply of emeralds according to market demand, thus keeping the Zambian emeralds market in order. 20091October 23-27, 165438+ Emerald raw materials were auctioned in Johannesburg, South Africa, and the price was 1.5 ~ 100 USD/carat.
2009 China Jewelry and Jade Jewelry Guide
In addition, the supply of amethyst, topaz and other crystal categories in Brazil is stable, while the supply of tourmaline raw materials has decreased.
Ruby minerals discovered in Tanzania in 2008 and Mozambique in 2009 are considerable, and their ruby raw materials have entered the international market in large quantities. Ruby from Mozambique can even be treated in Thailand with newly invented treatment technology. The treated low-quality raw materials can meet the quality requirements for making jewelry.
4. The gradual changes in the consumer market and the relationship between supply and demand.
Other natural colored gems, such as green garnet, manganese aluminum garnet (orange red and orange yellow), red spinel and emerald tourmaline (chrome tourmaline), will perform well in the market, because consumers are keen to collect these natural and unprocessed colored gems.
The United States is the largest consumer market of Tanzanite. As the main cutting and processing center of Tanzanite, India has gradually promoted this beautiful blue natural gem to the domestic market, which has gradually expanded the share of Tanzanite in the Indian jewelry market. China should also vigorously promote this gem and other rare colored gems mentioned above, and publicize and train consumers to give them more choices.
In the international market, there is a strong demand for red and blue tourmalines. Especially the red tourmaline, the demand in China is more considerable. Nigeria's tourmaline supply is stable, Mozambique's tourmaline also produces pale pink, green and blue tourmalines, and there are also varieties similar to Pale tourmaline. The mining of babesite mine in Pallai, Brazil has stopped. Therefore, high-quality Paraiba shellfish stone has become a necessary collection for gem collectors.
5. Promote the development of international colored gems market.
International colored gems's global sales are estimated at about $2.5 billion. The United States is the largest demand country, and the import volume in 2008 is estimated to be about1150 million US dollars. With the expected recovery of the world economy, it is believed that the demand for colored gems will rise again, which will also promote mining investment to increase supply. At the same time, the market will continue to pay attention to the transparency of supply chain, moral constraints of mining industry, environmental protection, social responsibility and fair trade. In the development in the next few years, American, European and Japanese markets will pay more attention to the disclosure and supervision of the negative impact of the above-mentioned focus issues, and even normalize such disclosure and supervision.
The International Association of colored gems (ICA) is working in this direction. "Gemstone Industry and Laboratory Summit" (GILC) will be restarted during the 20 10 Tucson exhibition in the United States. The National Jewelry and Jade Quality Supervision and Inspection Center (NGTC) will send people to participate. ICA has set up a special working group to work with AGTA (American Gemstone Chamber of Commerce), CIBJO (World Jewellery Union) and other related gemological organizations to formulate disclosure standards for colored gems. NGTC, ICA and GIT (Thailand Jewelry Association) jointly formulated the relevant standards for rubies and sapphires. The next project will be to work with emerald-related producing countries to formulate relevant standards for emeralds.
Following the annual meeting held in Panyu, Guangzhou in May, 2009, in addition to cooperating with our counterparts in China to formulate ruby and sapphire standards, we are also committed to communicating with jewelry industry associations in various countries to explore how to promote colored gems in China, Russian Federation and Eastern European countries. Of course, China is the first market to be promoted. At present, we have received strong support from Brazil, Colombia, Thailand and India. Recently, we have promised to provide our members with the opportunity to participate in the jewelry exhibitions held in China on 20 10, including the Beijing-Shanghai Jewelry Exhibition held by China Baoxie, which are also the two most important jewelry exhibitions in Chinese mainland. We believe that frequent face-to-face communication with customers is the best way to convey the knowledge and value of colored gems to them.
Japp is an important base of colored gems. During his recent visit to the region, he received strong support from ICA members in the region and local jewelry associations. The association has 2,800 members and holds a jewelry exhibition in Japp. We plan to organize local non-ferrous gem enterprises to participate in the 20 10 China Jewelry Exhibition and visit gem processing plants, jewelry manufacturers and traders in China. We also hope to attract China enterprises to attend or watch exhibitions in Japp, so as to understand and enter the Indian jewelry market.
In China, ICA cooperated with Shenzhen Shuibei International colored gems Center and invited overseas colored gems enterprises to settle in the center, so as to build Shenzhen into an international gem processing center to meet the growing demand for gem raw materials in China.
In terms of promotion, we also work closely with China Growth Enterprise Market. Incolour Quarterly, sponsored by the Association, will be published as a supplement to Gems of China. In addition, we also plan to hold a series of fashion jewelry activities in line with the fashion trend through the coordination of China Gems. In addition, colored gems Cutting and Grinding Competition and colored gems Jewelry Design Competition will be held.
Finally, the international colored gems market is huge, and ICA is only a molecule in this market. It's hard to develop colored gems's industry on our own. However, we will sincerely unite more forces to jointly promote the vigorous development of the international colored gemstone industry.