Talk:De Beers

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This article is written in South African English, which has its own spelling conventions (colour, realise, analyse) and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus.

Infobox problem

I'm not sure if anyone else is having this problem, but the infoboxes at the top of the article are doing bad things. There are multiple solutions for this, but I don't know enough about templates to make appropriate suggestions. superluser_tc 2007 August 24, 09:26 (UTC)

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Jewish

What is the point of mentioning that Oppenheimer was Jewish? Neither religion nor ethnicity of any other player in the De Beers saga is mentioned. How do we explain this? Why is it noteworthy? Ordinarily I fully understand the motivation of those identifying someone as Jewish out of context. I think the same is true here. Removed. Paul Beardsell (talk) 01:48, 8 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Prison Labour

The article does not mention the convict labour used by de beers, starting in 1884. I checked the archived discussion, and saw some mention of it. As far as I can understand it was taken down, most probably due to the questionable 10000 number. I think it is an important topic to be mentioned hence I found a trustworthy publication on the topic: "Convict labour, industrialists and the state in the US South and South Africa, 1870–1930" William H. Worger 2006 Journal of Southern African Studies Vol 30, Pages 63-86. https://doi.org/10.1080/0305707042000223942 Relevant part from the paper:

At much the same time that corporations in Alabama were largely monopolising the use of state and county prisoners for work in Birmingham mines, Cecil Rhodes was achieving an even tighter monopoly in the Cape Colony. During 1884 and 1885, using prison workers provided free of charge by the colonial administration, De Beers Consolidated Mines constructed a private prison large enough to house 300 inmates. Rhodes entered into negotiations with the Cape Colony government (of which he was an elected member) to secure ‘from time to time ... such able-bodied long sentenced native prisoners as they [De Beers] may require’. Agreement was reached on a two-year contract at the beginning of 1886. De Beers would be supplied with as many convicts as the company could accommodate so long as the number did not exceed 300, all to be chosen from African males whose sentences still had at least three months to run upon incarceration in the station. The company would not have to pay any fee for the convicts, but would have to bear all the costs of maintenance and surveillance. The civil commissioner for Kimberley (the senior civil servant), E. A. Judge, considered the contract of benefit to all involved. The prisoners would be ‘better housed, better fed, and better clad’ than the inmates of the Kimberley jail, De Beers would get reliable employees whose persons could be thoroughly searched to ensure that no diamonds were stolen, and the government would save ‘the expense of some 220 prisoners’, which was the average number incarcerated in the convict station during the first six months of 1886. With the contract signed on 1 January, the convict station opened immediately thereafter. The number of incarcerated rose steadily, averaging closer to 300 in 1887 and rising higher thereafter when De Beers entered into a new two-year contract in 1888 for an average of up to 400 convicts at any one time. Periodic renewals of the contract led to even greater increases in inmates with the daily average reaching over 1,000 by the late 1890s.

The references presented for this paragraph are from first-hand sources i.e. "the Memorandum of Agreement between De Beers and the colonial government" and the "superintendent reports of the De Beers Convict Station." I wanted to put the details here before editing because I am a non-user and there might be other considerations. But I honestly believe that there should be a section about this also using other sources which exist in the form of books. e.g. Stones of Contention: A History of Africa’s Diamonds, Todd Cleveland; South Africa's City of Diamonds: Mine Workers and Monopoly Capitalism in Kimberley, 1867-1895, William H. Worger 85.53.252.8 (talk) 17:12, 29 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Diamonds cutting

Sky laser process Bhavesh Dobariya Surat. India 103.251.59.78 (talk) 10:28, 8 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]