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South32 on Monday said its Australia manganese business was on track to resume production by the end of the year as the firm logged a sharp decline in quarterly production for the commodity hurt by a cyclone in March.
The Australian diversified miner’s first-quarter manganese production slumped as the Australia operation recorded nil output.
A tropical cyclone in March damaged infrastructure at the diversified miner’s Groote Eylandt Mining Co (GEMCO) project, part of its Australia Manganese division and forced it to withdraw its annual estimates for the business.
“We progressed a substantial dewatering program and a phased mining restart during the September quarter and remain on track to resume production from the primary concentrator during the December quarter,” South32 said in a statement.
The world’s biggest provider of manganese produced 597,000 wet metric tons (wmt) of the steel additive for the quarter ended Sept. 30, compared with a Visible Alpha consensus estimate of about 527,900 wmt, with the firm’s South Africa Manganese division contributing to the entirety of the production.
South32 added that planned maintenance is scheduled for its South Africa manganese operations in the June 2025 half year.
The company reiterated its production guidance across all operations for fiscal 2025.
(By Shivangi Lahiri and Sherin Sunny; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and Aurora Ellis)
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