Editor’s Note
As China solidifies its position as the world’s leading producer of lab-grown diamonds, industry leaders are convening to address the sector’s evolving challenges and opportunities. This article examines the current landscape, where technological parity with natural diamonds meets both internal hurdles and global competition, shaping the future of this dynamic market.
Lab-grown diamonds, also known as synthetic diamonds, are crystals manufactured in laboratories or factories through specific technologies and processes, possessing identical appearance, chemical composition, and crystal structure to natural diamonds. As a major producer of lab-grown diamonds, China contributes over half of the global output. However, the industry continues to face internal challenges and external competition amidst simultaneous growth in production volume and price reductions. How the industry responds to this new landscape is a key question many practitioners are actively exploring.
Guangzhou’s Panyu District, a globally renowned hub for major jewelry brands and China’s largest jewelry manufacturing base, hosted the 3rd China International Lab-Grown Diamond Industry Development and Innovation Conference on August 8th to address these issues. At the conference, the Guangzhou Diamond Exchange (GDE) reached strategic cooperation agreements with multiple universities and enterprises to form the China Lab-Grown Diamond Industry Alliance, aiming to help upstream and downstream companies jointly tackle market challenges and promote the high-quality development of China’s lab-grown diamond industry.
The conference featured a series of events including think-tank seminars, industry exhibitions, award ceremonies, and a lab-grown diamond jewelry design competition. Participants engaged in in-depth discussions on forward-looking topics such as industry development patterns, international exchange and cooperation, latest technological advancements, brand building, and market trend analysis. These diverse activities aimed to establish a trading system and build an industrial ecosystem for lab-grown diamonds, enhancing the brand influence of the GDE as a specialized trading and comprehensive service platform, and promoting stable growth and sustainable development of the industry.
At the event, the GDE held a strategic cooperation signing ceremony for the China Lab-Grown Diamond Industry Alliance with partners including the Guangzhou Laboratory of the National Gemstone Testing Group, the Henan Lab-Grown Diamond Trading Center, Henan SF Diamond Co., Ltd., Foshan Jinfusheng Investment Development Co., Ltd., Anhui Youpin New Materials Co., Ltd., and Zall Gold Group. It also established university-enterprise strategic partnerships with Guangzhou Panyu Polytechnic and the Jewelry College of Guangzhou City Institute of Technology. These collaborations aim to pool resources from within and outside the industry, promoting deep cooperation across the entire industrial chain in areas such as industry research and testing, domestic and international trading, live-streaming promotion, and talent education and incubation, thereby enriching the comprehensive service system for the lab-grown diamond industry and supporting its high-quality development.
Against the backdrop of an evolving global economic landscape, China’s lab-grown diamond industry is facing unprecedented opportunities and challenges. During the think-tank seminar, authoritative guests from China and abroad gathered to interpret for the industry the symbiotic and win-win development pattern between lab-grown and natural diamonds, the global trade landscape and future direction of the lab-grown diamond industry, and new technological progress in the field.
Furthermore, the conference held the launch ceremony for the industry co-construction of the “Identification and Grading of Pink Lab-Grown Diamonds” group standard. This standard aims to address prominent issues such as inconsistent grading and classification of pink lab-grown diamonds and chaotic market trading behaviors and pricing systems, further standardizing market order, protecting consumer rights, and providing strong support for the healthy and orderly development of the industry.
As a major producer of lab-grown diamonds, contributing over half of the global output and possessing strong competitive advantages in the upstream supply chain, China has classified the lab-grown diamond industry as a strategic emerging industry encouraged and supported by national policy. The goal is to form new quality productive forces through technological innovation and industrial upgrading, providing new momentum for economic development.
The conference venue, Guangzhou’s Panyu District, is a world-famous jewelry brand cluster and the nation’s largest jewelry manufacturing base. Thirty percent of the world’s jewelry and 70% of jewelry from Hong Kong and Macao are produced in Panyu. Here, numerous cases of industrial upgrading, pushing jewelry enterprises from “manufacturing” to “intelligent manufacturing,” are in full swing.
In recent years, leveraging its solid industrial foundation, complete industrial chain, and rich cultural, tourism, and commercial resources, Panyu District has comprehensively enhanced the reputation and international influence of “World Jewelry, Panyu Intelligent Manufacturing.” It promotes the formation of a benchmark for the integration of culture, commerce, and tourism within the jewelry industry, aiding Guangzhou in building itself into an international consumption center city and a fashion capital. The district has introduced policies to promote the transformation, upgrading, and high-quality development of its jewelry industry. Aligned with Guangzhou’s positioning as an international consumption center, it drives the coordinated development of the industrial chain led by key projects such as the Shawan Treasure Town, the Daluotang Jewelry Cluster, the Guangdong Jewelry & Jade Exchange, and the Guangzhou Diamond Exchange. It supports the establishment of design, new product R&D, and new brand incubation centers, and strengthens intelligent technological operations in production areas such as robotics, diamond processing, and 3D printing.
Currently, Panyu District is actively promoting the permanent settlement of the China International Lab-Grown Diamond Industry Development and Innovation Conference in Panyu. It organizes jewelry enterprises to participate in professional exhibitions like the China International Jewelry Fair, the Hong Kong Jewellery & Gem Fair, and the China (Guangzhou) International Beauty Expo, polishing the “China Window” to empower the global lab-grown diamond industry.