For 400 years the craftsmen and traders of Peshawar’s jewelry bazaar have cut, polished, set and haggled over precious gems dug from the rugged mountains of northwest Pakistan.
Pakistan’s gem and jewelry exports have boomed in recent years but Taliban violence, a crippling power crisis and outdated production methods are taking their toll in Peshawar, where traders say business has slumped alarmingly in the past 12 months.
Traders like Shehzad Sabz Ali say business is collapsing and foreign buyers in particular have been scared off — a major problem in a sector where exports account for 95 percent of the market.
The buyers from the United States, Thailand, France, Germany and Dubai who once thronged the packed market are largely a thing of the past.
Online dealing may be the thing of the moment, but traders like Ali, whose businesses have been built on generations of salesmanship and personal relationships, feel it is ineffective.
