Belgium has increased its exports of polished diamond for the first three months of 2008 by 20.3 percent, reports say. The value of the exports amounted to $3.158 billion as noted by the HRD Diamond Office. Year-to-date rough diamond exports increased by 5% to $3.07 billion with an average value of $87.6 per carat.

With respect to the India-Belgium trade, the exports increased by 168 percent in value to $125.25 million and by 54% in volume to 191,924 carats. The average value of polished exports to India was $652.6 per carat. India was the sixth-largest polished diamond imported from Belgium for he first quarter of 2008.

Belgium’s rough imports increased by 8% to $2.9 billion and polished imports hiked by 31% to $3.05 billion at $1,097 per carat.