After three months of not processing a single diamond, Australia's largest diamond mine is now back in production, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported.

The Argyle mine in Western Australia's far north stopped producing to avoid low diamond prices, but was able to keep the majority of employees working, spending $9 million on upgrading its processing plant.



General Manager of production, Maryanne Kelly, said that the Argyle diamond mine is in a better position to take advantage of higher prices, which she says are just around the corner. "We're starting back up because we want to put diamonds back into the marketplace in a more controlled manner, so we're actually feeding some of our lower grade material to use it up during tough times," she said, according to the ABC report.



"It (the lower grade material) has to go through the diamond processing plant at some stage. We'll feed it through sooner rather then later to enable our plant to run at full production, so that when the diamond price returns mid to late next year, we'll be able to feed higher grade material and get a better price for our diamonds."



Australian Broadcasting Corporation.