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credit : Cretep . High-security administration building and transportation machinery below , Jwaneng Diamond Mine , Botswana .

Chile

Botswana

The richest diamond mine in the world , located in south-central Botswana , is open pit and covers an area of 130 acres .

The Jwaneng diamond mine is owned by Debswana , a partnership between the De Beers company and the government of Botswana . It is the second newest of four mines operated by the company , having begun operations in 1982 .

With 2,100 employees , the mine produces almost 10mn tonnes of ore a year and retrieves an average of 11mn carats per year .

Chuquicamata is the largest open pit copper mine in terms of excavated volume in the world . It is located in the north of Chile , outside Calama .

People have been sourcing copper from the region for many centuries , with evidence of ancient works found across the site .

Measuring 4.3 miles and 3,000 ft deep , current production sees half-a-million tonnes of copper extracted a year . With facilities already in place to increase this by 50 %, production at this mine is not due to slow down anytime soon . 64 May 2023