Mozambique’s ruby mining goes from ‘Wild West’ to big business
Maputo — Sebastiao Pedro struck it lucky in 2014 when, as a 21-year-old small-scale miner, he found a large red ruby in northern Mozambique. He sold it to a buyer from Vietnam for $43,000, returned to his family about 1,450km away and built a house with the proceeds. Then the money ran out. This year he went back to Montepuez, home to the world’s biggest known ruby deposit, hoping to find another small fortune. He was disappointed. A crackdown by the authorities has seen thousands of local diggers and traders arrested. Hundreds of others from as far away as Thailand have been deported. "The situation is difficult because the police have been sending people away and the concession areas are full of company security and we can no longer work," Pedro said as he and five fellow diggers in dust-stained clothes scratched around in the gravel beside a small dam. A few hundred metres away is Gemfields Group’s ruby operation. After a woodcutter discovered a shiny red stone there in 2009, as ...
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