Diamonds: lab-grown vs mined

Summary

Business Daily – "Diamonds: Lab-Grown vs Mined"

BBC World Service | Host: Ed Butler | Aired: April 27, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode of Business Daily, Ed Butler travels to Sierra Leone to explore the troubled state of the global diamond industry, focusing particularly on the tectonic shift caused by lab-grown diamonds. By weaving together stories from artisanal miners, community members impacted by mine closures, industry experts, and jewelers, the episode delves into the economic, social, and ethical complexities of both mined and synthetic diamonds. The episode asks: Can lab-grown gems truly replace traditionally mined stones, and at what cost—both human and environmental?

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Collapse of Traditional Mining in Sierra Leone

• Struggling Miners & Communities ([02:01]–[07:46])
  • Artisanal mining is a make-or-break livelihood. Many miners, like Daniel Thibault, report near-impossible odds:

    "Sometimes for the whole of the year, you can't get anything. It is by the grace of God you find a diamond."
    —Daniel Thibault ([02:01] / [07:27])

  • The recent closure of Sierra Leone’s largest diamond mine has devastated local communities.

    "Laying down 1,000 workers—it was a chaos... Our husbands, our children are no longer going to school... Some marriages have already collapsed."
    —Finda Konomani, market trader ([04:58])

  • Consequences include rising crime, domestic violence, and economic deprivation:

    "The crime rate is increasing every day. Breaking of houses, the child abuse, the domestic violence. Violence has increased to a higher level just because of this mining company [closure]."
    —Finda Konomani ([05:39])

2. The Reality of Diamond Extraction

• Unregulated Digging & Diminishing Returns
  • Many resort to small-scale, often unregulated, mining—risking little reward:

    "Whenever we come, we take the soil and through it, it is the gravel. There we find the diamond."
    —Daniel Thibault ([06:53])
    "I have not made a lot of money yet... For the whole of the year, you can't get anything."
    —Daniel Thibault ([07:27])

  • Decades of extraction mean most valuable stones now lie deeper, out of reach. One rare 12-carat rough stone can be worth $80-100k at source, but this is increasingly uncommon ([07:46]).

3. The Lab-Grown Disruption: Indian and Chinese Influence

• How Lab Diamonds Are Made & Their Market Impact ([08:44]–[13:19])
  • Factories, mostly in India and China, use chemical vapor deposition (CVD) or high-pressure, high-temperature (HPHT) processes to grow diamonds:

    "The factory I went to... you could not see the end of. Each one with a thousand-plus huge diamond-making machines... there's no limit on how many synthetic diamonds can be made, there's no limit on how low the price could go."
    —Jason Cohn, documentary maker ([09:14])

  • This scale is driving prices down by up to 40%. The sector is now estimated at $30 billion/year ([10:48]).

4. Debating Ethics & Environmental Claims

• Arguments For Lab-Grown ([11:19])
  • Advocates argue lab-diamonds are ethical and eco-friendly:

    "People... are going to get more conscious about climate change, about extracting too much from the earth... the industry’s dependence on naturally mined diamonds is going to be less."
    —Rohit Mehta, CEO, 4Link Ventures ([11:19])

• Skepticism & Rebuttals ([11:54])
  • Critics contest lab-grown’s green credentials, noting their energy intensity:

    "These reactors run at the temperature of the sun... they're like data centers. That's the kind of energy that they require to operate... there’s nothing really socially or environmentally responsible about this."
    —Stanley Maturam, environmental consultant ([12:26])

  • He further claims:

    "Diamond mining, classic hard rock diamond mining, is the cleanest form of mining... you create jobs, you create entire ecosystems, you uplift the lifestyles of women and children, education... a most sustainable diamond would probably be a natural diamond when done correctly."
    —Stanley Maturam ([13:27])

5. The Industry's Response: Proving Provenance & Fair Trade

• De Beers' Initiatives & Local Partnerships ([14:32]–[16:49])
  • De Beers’ Gemfair aims to empower artisanal miners with equipment, skills, and access to fair pricing and ethical standards:

    "The idea is to connect the market... and also to empower them... We give them training, skills... make sure no forced labor is practiced. We provide them with working equipment."
    —Raymond Alpha, Gemfair representative ([15:38])

  • There is also a push for traceable, ‘story-rich’ stones—to win back ethical consumers and repair damage done by association with ‘blood diamonds.’

6. Retail Realities: What Consumers Care About

• Jewelry Retail Trends ([17:57]–[19:11])
  • Price, size, and perception drive customer choice far more than provenance:

    "The determining factor has been the price and the size of the stone—you know the phrase, size matters. They're going for the biggest bling they can afford."
    —Doug Meadows, Atlanta jeweler ([17:57])

  • Shift in US sales:

    "In the past five, six years, our natural diamonds have dropped to represent about 20% of our total diamond sales. And lab grown has become 80%..."
    —Doug Meadows ([18:12])

  • He struggles to communicate the value of traceable, natural diamonds:

    "To try to educate a consumer the value in a natural diamond is a new task, a new challenge that I don't know how we do it yet."
    —Doug Meadows ([18:30])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the odds of artisanal mining:
  "It is by the grace of God you find a diamond."
  —Daniel Thibault ([02:01])
• On the impact of mine closure:
  "Our husbands, our children are no longer going to school. Some marriages have already collapsed... Just because of the closure of that mining company."
  —Finda Konomani ([04:58])
• On the scale of lab-grown production:
  "There’s no limit on how many synthetic diamonds can be made, there’s no limit on how low the price could go."
  —Jason Cohn ([09:14])
• On lab-grown’s environmental impact:
  "These reactors run at the temperature of the sun... nothing really socially or environmentally responsible about this."
  —Stanley Maturam ([12:26])
• On fair trade diamonds:
  "We give them training, skills to make sure... no forced labor is practiced at the mine sites."
  —Raymond Alpha ([15:38])
• On consumer preferences:
  "Size matters. They're going for the biggest bling they can afford..."
  —Doug Meadows ([17:57])

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [02:01] – Artisanal mining realities and community hardship
• [04:58] – Finda Konomani describes social chaos after mine closure
• [06:53] – Daniel Thibault on the labor and luck of diamond panning
• [09:14] – Jason Cohn details scale of lab-grown diamond factories
• [11:19] – Rohit Mehta on the ethical promise of lab-diamonds
• [12:26] – Stanley Maturam on the environmental pitfalls of synthetic stones
• [15:38] – Raymond Alpha explains Gemfair’s approach to fair trade
• [17:57] – Doug Meadows on retail trends and consumer priorities

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Tone & Style

• The reporting is immersive and empathetic, with Ed Butler providing vivid descriptions of both Sierra Leone’s bustling markets and remote mining pits.
• Community members share their struggles in direct, heartfelt language.
• Industry experts provide frank, sometimes blunt, analysis—with clear disagreement between advocates for lab-grown and traditional mining.
• The tone is investigative, at times somber, pressing on ethical ambiguities and the chasm between marketing claims and ground realities.

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Conclusion

The episode paints a complex, global portrait of an industry in flux: as lab-grown diamonds disrupt long-standing economic and social structures in diamond-producing regions like Sierra Leone, ethical and environmental claims on both sides are hotly contested. The future of "real" diamonds—natural or cultured—may depend more on market trends and consumer perception than on resolve over provenance or sustainability. Meanwhile, tens of thousands in Sierra Leone and elsewhere must navigate collapsing prices and uncertain livelihoods, still clinging to the age-old hope of striking it rich in the dirt.

Transcript

[Ed Butler]

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[Ed Butler]

Hi there, I'm Ed Butler. Welcome to the second of our programmes on Business Daily from the BBC World Service looking at the troubled state of the diamond industry. I'm in Sierra Leone where artisanal diamond mining has become a way of life.

[Daniel Thibault]

Well, I have not made a lot of money yet. Sometimes for the year you can't get anything. For the whole of the year you can't get anything. It is by the grace of God that you find a diamond.

[Ed Butler]

As we heard in yesterday's program, there is a history of war here and also deep rooted corruption. Can new lab grown diamonds made in other countries take the place of traditionally mined gems?

[Rohit Mehta]

People are going to all over the world are going to get more conscious about extracting too much from the earth and the dependence of the industry on the naturally mined diamonds is going to be less.

[Ed Butler]

Is there trouble in diamond land? The future of the industry On Business Daily from the BBC. We're now walking into the flea market area of Koidu City. This is where they sell everything from old Shoes to cleaning products to clothing, soap and soft drinks. There's still plenty of people around, but they say that trade is down here substantially in the last few months.

[Daniel Thibault]

It is not really easy, but you try, you have to push, you have to find mints.

[Ed Butler]

Is it worse than it used to be here?

[Raymond Alpha]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Ed Butler]

Really? It is not easy, really.

[Rohit Mehta]

Right.

[Ed Butler]

We're now stepping into Benza market. This is the main fish market in the middle of the town. It's a huge hallway with a big corrugated iron roof. There are hundreds of people in here. What's your name, madam?

[Finda Konomani]

My name is Finda Konomani.

[Ed Butler]

And Finda, what are you selling here?

[Finda Konomani]

Fish. This one airy. This one pollock.

[Ed Butler]

So how much profit do you make? I mean you take home at the end of the day.

[Finda Konomani]

50.

[Ed Butler]

That's all? Just a couple of dollars?

[Finda Konomani]

Yes.

[Ed Butler]

Wow. Is business less good than it used to be? Has it got worse?

[Finda Konomani]

No. Fire again?

[Ed Butler]

First time.

[Finda Konomani]

This one we sell 300 in local creo.

[Ed Butler]

Finder tells me how hard trade has become recently due to the closure of the country's largest diamond mine. Based here in Koidu town in the east of the country. Victoria Avopombo has seen the wider consequences. She's a women's rights activist based in the town.

[Finda Konomani]

There was a lot of saga, a lot of deprivation, a lot of issues. Laying down 1,000 workers, it was a chaos. So women were coming to our asking us, this is our pain, this is our challenge. Our husbands, our children are no longer going to school. Some have five kids, some have. Some marriages have already collapsed. In fact, the abuse case is increasing every day just because of the closure of that mining company.

[Ed Butler]

More abuse, more robbery, more robbery, more abuse.

[Finda Konomani]

Even in the sites a lot of things are happening.

[Ed Butler]

What are people doing to get by?

[Finda Konomani]

Yeah, some of them are digging gold. Because diamond is now scarce. The crime rate is increasing every day. Breaking of houses, the child abuse, the domestic violence. Violence has increased to a higher level just because of this mining company. The mining economy is closed and the government is not saying anything. And the workers are suffering and there is no money.

[Ed Butler]

Some miners are switching to this, digging for diamonds in the in any free plot of land they can find. It has been a part time endeavor across the region for decades. It's often unregulated with diamonds found frequently smuggled out to avoid the payment of duties. I'm standing in an open valley. There are huge pits in front of me. Pits filled with orange sandy water. Men digging at the sand along the banks and others sifting Silting through the mud and the gravel, all aiming for one thing, to find the rich, precious stones that lie abundantly naturally in this landscape.

[Daniel Thibault]

Whenever we come, we take the soil and through it, it is the gravel. There we find the diamond.

[Ed Butler]

It's kind of like a bright blue grey soil that you're crushing in your fingers now. And inside you have the stones. I'm fingering it now.

[Daniel Thibault]

Yeah. Sometimes the damu lies in it.

[Ed Butler]

So it'd just be a tiny, tiny little fragment, like a tiny piece of dirt.

[Daniel Thibault]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like this.

[Ed Butler]

How much money do you make normally doing this work for me?

[Daniel Thibault]

Well, I have not made a lot of money yet. Sometimes for the whole of the year, you can't, you can't get anything. For the whole of the year, you can't get anything. It is through by the grace of God that you find a diamond. It is not a spot.

[Ed Butler]

Thin pickings, then, decades of extraction mean the remaining worthwhile stones now lie mostly at a deeper level, beyond the reach of picks and shovels. So this what it's all about, I'm holding in my hand now a stone, a diamond. It's maybe the size of my small fingernail, smallest finger. Fingernail. And it's what, 12 carats? Apparently it's got some imperfections on the outside. This is a rough diamond, but it's worth, I'm told even here, before it leaves the country, 80 to $100,000, this small stone. And when it reaches the Western market and cut, it'll be worth an awful lot more. But diamonds of this size and purity are rare and prices have been falling sharply over the last five years. This is why lab grown diamonds, diamonds produced in factories either by chemicals, chemical vapor over several days, or by using high pressure and high temperature. India alone is producing perhaps 3 million of these diamonds a year, collapsing global prices by as much as 40%. Jason Cohn is a documentary maker who has researched and visited some of the diamond making foundries.

[Stanley Maturam]

The factory that I went to was the size of a college campus and they had these enormous, enormous rooms that you could not see the end of, you know, each one with, you know, I think a thousand plus huge diamond making machines. And they were just growing. So because there is no limit on how many synthetic diamonds can be made, there's no limit on how low the price could go, essentially.

[Ed Butler]

Jason Cohn, you're listening to Business Daily on the BBC World Service.

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[Ed Butler]

I'm Ed Butler and today I'm looking at the challenges facing the natural diamond industry. Specifically the rise of lab grown diamonds, gems made in factories, an industry which is now valued at some $30 billion a year. Rohit Mehta is CEO of 4Link Ventures. It's a commodities house based in India's diamond capital Surat. He says that lab grown diamonds aren't just cheaper, they're also more ethically and environmentally sourced. There's no blood on these stones, he argues.

[Rohit Mehta]

I see a situation where people are going to all over the world are going to get more conscious about climate change, about extracting too many, too much from the natural, from the earth. And because of this there may be a situation where the dependence the industry on the naturally mined diamonds is going to be less and people will be looking more towards lab grown diamonds. And that is where a big boom in the lab grown diamond industry is going to happen.

[Ed Butler]

There is a counter view.

[Stanley Maturam]

Prices have significantly collapsed which has reduced the beauty of the story behind the diamond and brought down the value of the natural diamond market.

[Ed Butler]

Stanley Maturam is a US based environmental consultant who studied the growth of the lab grown industry from 1% of the global market in 2015 to some 20% now. He completely rejects the idea that lab grown is somehow better either for the planet or for humanity.

[Stanley Maturam]

I would bluntly say it's untrue. It is factually not defined by science. That is, these are really not lab made. So these are manufactured in mass amounts in a factory and the biggest impact that they make is energy. These reactors run at the temperature of the sun. They're like data centers. That's the kind of energy that they require to operate these. And how many people did you help? What was the broader benefit of the community and all of that stuff? There's nothing really socially or Environmentally responsible about this.

[Ed Butler]

Where are they mostly being made?

[Stanley Maturam]

The lab grown diamond right now, as I know, most of them are made in India and China. All of the CBD stuff is made in India. HPHT is made in China. Those are the two different forms of making lab grown diamonds, which is chemical vapor deposition. And HPHD is high pressure, high temperature. Two different processes. That's how they do it.

[Ed Butler]

Stanley Matharm also says that the allegations of environmental destruction levelled against artisanal diamond mining have been exaggerated.

[Stanley Maturam]

It's hard rock mining. It is the cleanest form of mining. There are no chemicals used. You're not talking about iron ore mining or gold mining. These all have other issues. But diamond mining, classic hard rock diamond mining is the cleanest form of mining. And when done correctly is not only does it provide a lot of social benefits, it's like these holes in the ground become future reservoirs, clean, properly maintained ecosystems. These are the carbon sinks. They become the most biodiverse, ecosystem friendly mining form that you can sustain for climate. And the most important thing, you can actually quantify the social impact. Economies develop, you create jobs, you create entire ecosystems, you uplift the lifestyles of women and children, education, the best significant benefits. So to compare it, a most sustainable diamond would probably be a natural diamond when done correctly.

[Ed Butler]

The traditional diamond industry is trying to push back now. The British multinational diamond company De Beers has recently launched ads like this one promoting the traditional stones.

[Stanley Maturam]

The diamond you choose should match your journey, match the patience you took to find each other, and match the resilience that formed the essence of your course. And that is a natural diamond. Because just like your journey, a natural diamond is worth the wait.

[Ed Butler]

As well as TV commercials, De Beers has launched gemfair. It's a venture in Sierra Leone aimed at giving artisanal miners better equipment and a fair price for their diamond finds. You might call it fair trade for diamonds. Part of the campaign to change that difficult association some people have with war and corruption. Raymond Alpha is gemfair's local representative.

[Raymond Alpha]

The idea is to connect the market so that they can be able to find a place to sell their diamonds when they find diamonds. And also to empower them to be able to know what they are doing, access to markets and a fair value. We give them training, we give them skills to make sure that they are polehumorized at the mine site. We make sure that no forced labor is practiced at the mine sites. We provide them with the working equipment

[Ed Butler]

and hopefully to improve the reputation of

[Raymond Alpha]

diamond mining, the reputation of the industry, which I Think we are following by introducing the GemFlow standard.

[Ed Butler]

Do they get a better price from you guys?

[Raymond Alpha]

That's what I've heard them testify. They are happy with fair price. If you're not happy, you are free to walk out and find another buyer

[Ed Butler]

to sell a diamond. I guess that has this story, the story of a piece of stone that was dug by guys like these guys standing next to us who are digging in a soil, in a well regulated pit with good cleaning, good sanitation, good human rights, all the rest of it that you've mentioned that improves the value, I guess of the stone when it comes to market.

[Raymond Alpha]

Yeah, I agree. And that's the reason why we are trying as much as possible possible.

[Ed Butler]

Gemfare is growing.

[Raymond Alpha]

Yes, gemfare is growing because we started from few membership and now we are getting to 500 about that mine sites that have joined the program since so. And we still get people expressing interest to join.

[Ed Butler]

It's a difficult time though, right, because prices are falling in the diamond market because of these lab grown diamonds that are coming out of China and India and other places. So do you think there's a long term future for the diamond industry here?

[Raymond Alpha]

I think it will be best to contact maybe De Beers then we'll talk about that.

[Ed Butler]

Well, I did contact De Beers and they told me that West African diamonds are an important source for the global market. And they said with people increasingly wanting to know where other products like coffee, cotton or chocolate come from, the gemfair model connects people more closely to the stories of their individual diamonds as well and the livelihoods that it supported along the way. Well, that's the intended message, but is it really being heard?

[Doug Meadows]

The determining factor has been the price and the size of the stone. You know the phrase size matters. They're going for the biggest bling that they can afford.

[Ed Butler]

I guess that's Doug Meadows. He's an Atlanta based jeweler.

[Doug Meadows]

At the end of the day I have to give my consumer what they're asking for or looking for. In the past 5, 6 years our natural diamonds have dropped to represent about 20% of our total diamond sales. And lab grown has become 80% of my diamond sales.

[Ed Butler]

It's just collapsed.

[Doug Meadows]

Yeah, some of it's perception, you know, people coming in thinking of the idea of a blood diamond. The lab grown community has touted it as being ethical and eco friendly and all this kind of stuff and you know, I could never buy that. I've always been an advocate for what I call mine to market to where I can know the traceability of either a gemstone or a diamond. But to try to educate a consumer the value in a natural diamond is it's a new task, a new challenge that I don't know how we do it yet. I'm hoping the industry can give us some help.

[Ed Butler]

The thoughts of the US Jewelry retailer Doug Meadows. Back in the pit. Daniel Thibault is still digging and hoping for his first diamond find.

[Daniel Thibault]

I think I have one here. Wherever you find these things, those blacks,

[Ed Butler]

the black stone is a sign there may be diamonds as well. Whatever the taste and the falling value of diamonds on the global market, Daniel and tens of thousands of other Sierra Leoneans are still digging and hoping. For now, they say they don't have much choice.

[Daniel Thibault]

So unfortunately, there is no diamond here.

[Ed Butler]

That's it for these two programs on the challenges facing the diamond industry here in West Africa from me, Ed Butler. Take care.