The Mozambican Government assured yesterday that it has fulfilled all the requirements internationally required for the export of diamonds, showing confidence in the country’s admission to the group of States that sell and export this type of gemstone.
“What Mozambique has done was to take the 2016 [international] report where all the recommendations and compliances came from, and Mozambique fully complied with all such recommendations,” said Castro Elias, executive director of the Kimberley Process Mozambican Management Unit.
Elias was speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the plenary meeting of the Kimberley Process, an entity created by the United Nations to prevent the sale of so-called “blood diamonds”, often used to finance illegitimate wars.
The aforementioned international organization is meeting in Moscow to, among other items on the agenda, decide on Mozambique’s entry into the legal diamond trade.
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Elias said that the country had complied with the requirements of creating a state unit responsible for the assessment and certification process for extraction, transport and export, a duly equipped supervisory board, which includes a member of civil society, a commercial warehouse and training of specialized personnel.
The executive director of the Kimberley Process Management Unit said that Mozambique’s acceptance into the international diamond trade will allow the activation of 40 prospecting and exploration licenses and 78 applications for licenses, which are currently inoperative because the country has not yet been authorized to sell that type of product.
“Companies [that are in the area of diamond research and trade] are not doing anything, because Mozambique is not a member of the process and by not being a member, they cannot export finished products,” he pointed out.
The country’s entry into the international diamond transaction, he continued, will result in job creation and corporate social responsibility actions, including the construction of social infrastructure.
Castro Elias stressed that Mozambique has diamonds in the provinces of Gaza, in the south, Manica and Tete, in the center, and Niassa, in the north.
The Mozambican delegation to the plenary meeting of the Kimberley Process is headed by the Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy, Max Tonela.
