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Due to the impact of COVID-19 and weather, mineral company South32, based in Australia, has reduced its manganese ore production in Australia.
The company said that the guidance
production in the fiscal year from July 2021 to June 2022 had decreased by 9%
to 3.2 million tons compared with the same period of the previous year, and the
production from July to December fell from 1.83 million tons to 1.7 million
tons. The output from October to December was 807,000 tons, down 15% from the
same period last year and 10% from the previous quarter.
Australian manganese ore sales between July and December were 1.74 million tons, down 7% from the same period last year.
After the output increased by 7% to 1.16 million tons from July to December, the annual guidance output of its South African business remained at 2.2 million tons. Due to the decline of inventory and the optimization of sales mix according to market conditions, the sales volume increased by 9% to 1.2 million tons during the period. The increase in the production of high-quality manganese ore at Mamatwan mine was offset by the shutdown of equipment maintenance from October to December.
South32's Australian business benefited
from the increase in the average price of its products, but the average price
of manganese ore was slightly lower. The average price of USD 4.59/dmtu is 17%
higher than that in the first half of 2020-21 and 6% higher than that in the
second half of 2020-21. The average price of South African products is US
$3.47/dmtu, 1 percentage point lower than the first half of 2020-21 and 3
percentage points lower than the second half of 2020-21.