Russia plans to introduce some diamond export duties this year to support the struggling domestic diamond-cutting industry, a deputy finance minister said on Tuesday.
Alexei Moiseev said the finance ministry was discussing its proposed “lenient” export tariff scheme with Russian diamond miner and exporter Alrosa, the world’s largest diamond producer by carat.
“If we wait a little longer, we will simply lose the (diamond-cutting) expertise we still have,” he said, adding that the tariffs would only apply to stones that are cost-effective to cut in Russia.
Moiseev said the ministry saw no need to buy diamonds for the state-owned repository Gokhran from Alrosa even as the company faces a protracted crisis in the diamond industry.
It has been under US sanctions since 2022. In January 2024, G7 countries banned the import of Russian diamonds.
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“As for Alrosa, firstly, things aren’t so bad. Secondly, we see signs of market stabilization,” Moiseev said.
Alrosa reduced production by 10% to 29.8 million carats in 2025 and forecasts a further decline in 2026 to 25-26 million carats.
(By Elena Fabrichnaya, Lucy Papachristou, Anastasia Lyrchikova and Alessandra Prentice; Editing by Guy Faulconbridge and Mark Potter)
