Rough Amber - Availability and Pricing
By John Fudala
At the 2005 Amberif show in Gdansk, Poland, Russian dealers switched overnight from pricing rough amber in USD to EURO. Numbers stayed the same, but it was a large increase in price. At that time, as I recall, a kilo of rough amber in large, 300-500g pieces was about USD 350. They all sold out the first day. Mass produced silver and amber jewellery prices were around USD 1.00 to 1.20 per gram.
Russian mine in Yantarny at it's height around the year 2000 produced 900 to 1100 tons of amber per year, but only 300 tons were of jewellery quality. Following the flooding of its beach pit, the production dropped to 300 tons per year. Rough amber prices increased significantly but it did not have much effect on amber industry as the large businesses still have adequate supplies.
This year, according to the Amber Association, total rough amber output from Russia will be 140 tons, their own consumption 80 tons and export 60tons. Poland's own output will be 15 tons, consumption 140 tons, import 75 tons, which leaves deficit of 50 tons!
Last year in Poland they purchased 90 tons of rough Baltic amber from the following sources:
- gathered on beaches - 3 tons
- rinsed out (legally and illegally) - 12 tons
- imported (legally) - 20 tons
- suitcase import - 55 tons (incl. 35 tons from Ukraine)
It had however sparked renewed interest in fakes and substitutes for Baltic amber. Mexican and Dominican amber are used, but they are rather expensive and represent really a novelty market at best, with total mining output at few tones per year. Colombian copal however is cheap and some people mastered a way to stabilize it through thermal processing which results in a hard stone of unusual coloring. In fact, the International Amber Association has recently taken back its certificate of authenticity from several large amber firms who have introduced and sold products made of copal as Baltic amber. It should improve the overall ambience of Amberif fair which this last March was rather filled with air of uncertainty about both prices and fakes.
John Fudala lives in Northbrook, Illinois, a Chicago suburb. He is a collector of fossil resins from all over the World. His collection can be viewed at The Museum of The Earth (PAN) in Warsaw, as well as at Museum of Amber Inclusions at the Univeristy of Gdansk, Poland. He is a member of the International Amber Association.
