[MUSIC PLAYING]
In the last several years, Belmont
has moved from a mining company that just sells rough,
up the value chain to cutting some of their own production
and selling the faceted stones.
This last trip in 2014 was the first time
I visited their cutting facility.
When we visited the Belmont cutting facility in Itabira,
we noticed it was a small operation,
compared to say, operations in China or in Jaipur, India.
But a very well organized, very professional operation,
with extremely talented people.
This is really necessary for them
to be able to be competitive in faceted gemstones,
faceted emeralds.
Because they have to compete with much lower labor
costs out of India and out of China and other locations.
So it has to be very efficient operation,
and they have to be able to turn out a very high quality
product, as they are cutting both calibrated
goods and free sized goods of a higher quality.
The first step in preparing the rough
is to use pliers to break away areas of phlogopite schist
or quartz from the emerald crystal
and then to trim off highly included areas
of the emerald crystal in a process called cobbing.
Once the emerald rough is being sorted,
the sorters will break it down into categories
of size, shape, color, and crystallisation or clarity.
They'll break it into various classifications for each
of these factors and then start creating parcels
that they will decide if they are going to cut in-house
or if they are going to sell as rough.
The shape really comes into effect
to decide what type of a cutting style they will have.
Often, the next step is sawing, as often the rough
will require it to be sawn in order to get the best results.
This is where you want the most experienced expert, the master
cutter, to start making some decisions.
Because once it's sawn, you can't really go back.
And you are looking at losing weight and money
and not getting as good of a quality stone
as you should if the right cut is not made.
This is really a lot of risk involved here,
and a lot of important decision making, and often
a bit of a gamble when you saw a stone, because that
will set the foundation for all the rest of the cutting.
The next stage, preforming, is also highly critical.
It sets the shape and the outline of the stone,
but also the orientation of the stone, to show the best color
or to hide inclusions in the most efficient manner.
After preforming, the preform must then
be attached to the dop in a process called dopping.
Here you can see that basically, a shellac-type substance is
heated up, and then the emerald is gently heated
so that it can be pushed into this shellac-type substance,
centered up, and then as the substance cools,
it will form a secure grip on the emerald,
so that at that point, the emerald can be faceted.
Here you can see several preformed emeralds
attached to the dops.
After preforming, then the stone is
taken to a girdling machine, where the girdle is cut
and polished.
And for calibrated goods, they get
very close to the exact size they need.
For the faceting stage, Belmont is using some Israeli machines
that are customized from traditional Jamp Peg machines.
Jamb Peg machines are used throughout the world,
especially in Southeast Asia.
And they are renowned for being extremely fast,
and in the hands of a skilled cutter, able
to put a high quality cut on the stones.
Now these Israeli machines allow for the same speed,
but a more precise cut, especially
on the symmetry and the dimensions.
This is highly critical for Belmont,
because they need to turn out product that is exactly cut
at a very, very high degree of precision
to be competitive against other areas in the world.
Now, notice here, this enables the cutter
to get exactly on the table, parallel
to the table with the lap, and put a beautiful polish on it.
You can see how quick the operation
is with these Israeli machines, but also very,
very, very precise.
Belmont is currently cutting about 70%
of their facet grade rough by value and 60% by volume.
So they have to cut the better quality material,
with the other percentages going primarily to Jaipur, India,
along with their bead quality and their cabochon quality
material, as it's just not economically
feasible to be able to cut it at their factory in Brazil.
After faceting, the stone and the dop
are then heated up again, so that it
can be cut off of the dop.
And now we're at the cleaning stage,
where the stone will be cleaned, and then it'll be inspected.
And here, Marcelo Ribeiro himself
is inspecting some of the cut emeralds.
The quality control portion of the operation,
again, is highly important.
Because they must turn out a high quality product
to be able to charge the price that they need to charge.