Representatives of South Africa’s National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) have announced a 9% wage increase from diamond producer De Beers Consolidated Mines, a subsidiary of Anglo American, averting a strike at the firm’s operations.
Initially, union representatives demanded a 13% increase before a last-minute deal prevailed, according to NUM senior negotiator Peter Bailey. “We struck a deal 20 minutes before the strike could commence,” Bailey told Reuters. In all, NUM has 1,300 employee members.
In 2012, De Beers produced 4 million carats of diamonds in South Africa, out of the total of 27.9 million carats it produced worldwide, according to company officials. De Beers, which is 85% Anglo American-owned, employs 2,550 workers at its mines Kimberley, Venetia and Voorspoed in the country with sub-Saharan Africa’s No. 1 economy.
