JOHANNESBURG (Commodity Online): Labour issues and other production related problems have been dogging South Africa’s platinum miners for quite some time now. And this has impacted the output of several bigwigs in the filed.
Recent production reports from two biggest platinum miners in South Africa for the September quarter showed management continuing to battle with labour and restructuring issues, although reports from diamond and iron-ore producers were more positive.
The platinum price has near doubled to 1350/oz this week from a low of 732/oz last October, but the strong rand has maintained pressure on margins for platinum miners. SA is the world’s biggest producer of the metal.
Anglo Platinum, the world’s biggest platinum miner, put two more shafts on care and maintenance in August, bringing the number of shafts suspended in the past six months to three.
It said it had eliminated 11,715 jobs in the nine months to September, above its original target of 10,000 jobs for the full year, and 714 more corporate posts would be cut.
Angloplat’s attributable platinum production for the quarter was 616500oz, down 2% on the June quarter and 10% lower than a year ago. It said it was on track to meet its full-year production forecast of 2,4-million oz.
Lonmin, the third biggest platinum miner after Impala Platinum, said total mined tonnages in the September quarter dropped 20% to 2,6-million year on year because it had ceased opencast platinum mining at Marikana and Pandora. About 500000 tons of mined production was lost because of safety related stoppages, but there was an improvement in safety , despite the loss of three lives , it said.
Angloplat, which has been set stringent safety targets by Anglo American CEO Cynthia Carroll, reported three deaths in the quarter, bringing the fatality rate for the year so far to 13.
Anglo American’s iron ore unit, Kumba Iron Ore, grew total production 12% to 11,3-million tons in the September quarter compared with September last year and 15% compared with the June quarter as it increased its new jig plant at Sishen. Export sales in the quarter were the second-highest in history , at 9,4-million tons, after a record 11,1-million was sold in the June quarter, reflecting increased demand from European, Korean and Japanese customers . Domestic sales for the quarter were stable, but 39% lower year on year.
Kumba said there was an evident improvement in demand for iron-ore in the third quarter because of restocking and reviving production in the steel industry.
Anglo said demand for rough diamonds had continued to improve . De Beers had increased production 43% in the September quarter to 7,9-million carats compared with June. For the full year, output would be about half of last year's. In the March quarter, De Beers cut production 91% in response to a slump in demand.
Among Anglo American's other major operations, there was a 13% increase in copper production year on year, but thermal coal output fell 1% and metallurgical coal 2,6% to match demand from export markets.
