Kim Kardashian to Promote Botswana Diamonds

Kim Kardashian will be promoting diamonds from Batswana to help stimulate diamond sales from the African nation to the US market. With rough sales down 68 percent in the first quarter of this year, De Beers in Botswana is hoping promotions with the reality show star and creative designer will stimulate diamond sales, according to a report from the Sunday Standard Reporter.
Kardashian will be part of a Diamond Forum scheduled to visit the Jwaneng diamond mine as part of the group’s tour of Batswana. Other members of the group include Batswana’s former president Festus Mogae and Central Bank governor Linah Mohohlo, the head of De Beers in Botswana, Sheila Khama, told the Sunday Standard on Friday.

“We hope that her visit will add to the voice of the Diamond Fund,” Khama said.

Kardashian and members of the Diamond Forum will also visit Diamond Trading Botswana and Motswedi Rehabilitation School in Mochudi. The group arrives tomorrow and will depart on Wednesday.

Kardashian is another notable starlet De Beers is using to promote diamonds mined in Batswana. In 2002, supermodel Iman signed a million-dollar-a-year contract with De Beers to promote Batswana diamonds. After two yeas as De Beers’ “style icon” the Somalia-born supermodel resigned in mid-2004 over a controversy regarding the displacement of 2,500 bushmen. According to reports from London-based Survival International, the bushmen were evicted from their homeland after a diamond discovery near the Kalahari Game Reserve in the 1980s.