Namdeb, a 50-50 joint venture between De Beers and the Namibian government, said yesterday diamond output for this year would be less than half that of last year after it scaled down output, Reuters reported.

"We've been planning to scale down our diamond operations and the recession only accelerated the process by a year," Namdeb's GM Mitford Mundell told Reuters in an interview.



He said the company was faced with lower quality ore at its land operations and would not up production significantly until its brownfield expansion projects take fruit. Even then it would not go back to the levels seen before the recession.



Mundell said the company would produce 330,000 carats of diamonds from its land operations this year and around 600,000 carats from its marine diamond operations. That compares with a total output of 2.1 million carats in 2008.



He said next year the diamond producer expects to make just over 400,000 carats and 650,000 carats from its land and marine diamond operations respectively, and would keep around those levels in the next few years.

Namdeb shut down all its diamond operations for three months this year to preserve cash and to use up some of its stockpiles. Its workforce has also been reduced by about half, Mundell said.