JOHANNESBURG: In a bid to keep the shine on struggling natural diamond sales, industry giant De Beers has launched a verification device to differentiate natural gems from their laboratory-grown competitors, the company announced on Monday.

The `DiamondProof` device is meant to confirm authenticity of precious stones `formed deep within the Earth billions of years ago`, De Beers said in a press release, at a time when the industry faces strong competition and plummeting prices.

A black scanner-like machine available at retailers in the US, it detects `the distinct chemical compositions of natural diamonds`, De Beers said. `The natural diamond industry is in a constant effort to create separation from lab-grown` gems, which are cheaper and only take a few weeks to be produced, diamond industry analyst Edahn Golan said.

The launch `is part of a wider effort in the diamond industry to pull itself by the bootstraps` through marketing, pricing and consumer education, Golan said.

Diamond sales have struggled to recover since the Covid-19 pandemic, facing a downturn in consumer spending, particularly in China.-AFP