Expiration Date: 2060

Natural diamonds, as we all know, are a finite resource. However, do we know when we will run out of this mineral; at what point will Mother Earth let us know we've exhausted these riches, extracting all she has created over so many millions of years? Isn’t this an important piece of business intelligence information?

To answer that question, we must know a number of things. For example, at what rate will the world consume diamonds, at what rate will diamonds be mined, and what are the Earth's reserves?

This week Alrosa released some figures about the company including a previous state secret – Russia's diamond reserves. According to its H1 2011 Investor Presentation, the world's largest diamond producer, by volume, has total reserves of 1.226 billion carats.

How much of the total global reserves Russia holds is not clear, but probably a big chunk of it. Roughly speaking, it may hold as much as a third of the known global reserve. Currently they produce about 26 percent of annual global supply.

Alrosa expects production to keep growing in the next few years, but agrees that new resources are not keeping up with the depletion of known mines. They expect global production to start declining after 2018, after peaking at an annual production of 166 million carats, just seven more years of growth.

Demand, on the other hand keeps growing. Global diamond jewelry demand is forecast at approximately 6 percent annually, by value.

Mining is not likely to outpace demand. If anything, miners will try to remain a little behind – in good economic times as it helps to prop up prices, and acts as a margin buffer in bad times.

The volume of global diamond production increased last year by about 10 percent to 133 million carats, but 2010 was an unusual year in many respects. If we peg annual mining growth at 2 percent, by 2020 rough diamond production will grow to about 162 million carats. That works out to 1.49 billion carats mined in this decade.

Currently Alrosa estimates the life of Russia’s mines at 32 years. They expect to find more reserves and therefore forecast their 2020 life of mine at 37 years, lasting until 2057, 46 years from today.

De Beers, the second largest producer, has not disclosed its reserves since its privatization in 2004; however, unofficial company estimates put Botswana's reserves at +20 years.

So, how long will the reserves last? If the above is accurate, and adding improved mining technology, this natural resource may be essentially depleted within 50 years.

Food packaging carries a stamped expiration date, informing consumers when the goods inside will become inedible. Allowing for errors and barring some exciting new finds, the expiration date stamped on earth's diamond reserves is 2060, maybe 2090 if there are some surprising finds.

This, of course, is rather academic and appears to be a long way off, going beyond most of our own expected lifetimes. Nevertheless, for companies that think in terms of preparing for changes and multi-generational activity, this is a date that should be kept in mind.