The meeting of the Executive Committee of the World Federation of Diamond Bourses (WFDB) held at Shanghai along with the Asia-Pacific Presidents’ Summit on March 9 and 10 saw intensive discussions on a range of crucial issues affecting the global diamond industry, including pricing, standardised grading and generic promotions.

The two-day meet was hosted by the Shanghai Diamond Exchange and was attended by the WFDB leadership as well as presidents of diamond exchanges in the region, including China, Thailand, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Australia, Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea and Russia.

Deliberations focused on declining profitability for the WFDB's members due to high rough prices and falling polished prices, as well as the decrease in bank credit to the diamond trade and the necessity of boosting consumer demand via generic promotion campaigns. 

There was special appreciation of the work of the World Diamond Mark (WDM) in promoting generic diamond marketing, achieving tie-ups with Turkey and Dubai, as well as the launch of the WDM's new web site. The site will soon be available in Chinese, and will also feature WeChat, the Chinese version of Facebook.

WFDB President Ernie Blom said, "The Exco Meeting adopted a very firm stand on the issue of global standards of grading. We will have zero tolerance for flagrant abuse of grading standards.”

He added, "Coming to China, as with every previous visit, has again been an eye-opener. It takes $2 billion of diamond imports and turns them into $9 billion of diamond jewelry sales. We also had the pleasure of being hosted by the Vice-Mayor of Shanghai who expressed his support for the diamond and jewelry trade. These were two days of very positive meetings where regional presidents put the issues that impact the most on the table for discussion.”

The Asia-Pacific Presidents’ Summit accepted an offer from the Korea Diamond Exchange to host next year's meetings.