Diamond giant De Beers projects that diamond demand in India and China will rise 20% annually, and that the two nations are likely to make up half of the diamond industry's global growth in the next few years.

“China and India are the driving force, and China is the most visible incremental-demand driver,” De Beers Executive Director Stephen Lussier told New York Media. “India has been the fastest growing jewelry market.”

Diamond industry data suggests that diamond miner believes that economic growth and rising disposable incomes have boosted demand for diamond jewelry in both nations. India and China combined may rival the United States as the world’s biggest gem buyers in the next decade.

De Beers, which produces about 40% of the world’s diamonds, believes China’s demand for diamonds in jewelry, measured in polished wholesale prices, will probably become 16% by 2015, compared with 8% this year; while India’s share is likely to become 11%, from 7% this year.

Demand in the US is expected to rise as much as 4% annually, Lussier said, adding that “Christmas wasn’t bad last year and we realize that there are buyers if it is made accessible at the right price."

De Beers’s sales of unpolished and uncut gems jumped 84% in the H1-2010, boosted mainly by demand in India and China. The miner's output more than doubled to 15.4 million carats from the year earlier, it shut mines in Botswana and Namibia.