South African iron-ore quality among strongest of seaborne market, Kumba reports

This audio is brought to you by Endress and Hauser, a global leader in process and laboratory measurement technology, offering a broad portfolio of instruments, solutions and services for industrial process measurement and automation. The quality of iron-ore from Northern Cape is continuing to differentiate South Africa in the global iron-ore market. During the first half of this year, the average realised export price of $90 per wet metric tonne (wmt) was 8% above benchmark and among the strongest in the seaborne iron-ore market. Kumba Iron Ore's average iron content of was 63.6% while its lump-to-fines ratio remained approximately 66%, placing the Anglo American group company's products "We continue to supply markets beyond China, including Japan, South Korea, and Europe, achieving an overall price premium of $7 per ton above the benchmark," Kumba CEO Mpumi Zikalala told journalists during media call in which Mining Weekly participated. While China's steel demand is expected to plateau over time, long-term demand for premium iron-ore is expected to continue to be positive as higher-grade products play an increasingly important role in supporting new steel capacity, particularly in India as well as South East Asia. Moreover, ultra-high dense media separation (UHDMS), an advanced mineral processing technology being implemented by Kumba at its Sishen iron-ore mine, is expected to increase the volume of premium iron-ore to 55% of Sishen's production, up from the current 18%. At its core, UHDMS provides greater flexibility across a wider range of ore grades and densities. Meanwhile, Sishen's production will be lower as Kumba goes ahead with the UHDMS project tie-in, which means that Kumba's DMS plant at Sishen will be shut down, with only Sishen's jig plant remaining operational. The main tie-in is on track to begin next month. Engineering is substantially concluded, and all major procurement is complete at the UHDMS project, which is now 45% complete. To date, we have invested R5.2-billion rand in UHDMS, with the approved project capitals remaining unchanged at R11.2-billion. "The UHDMS is an investment in Kumba's future. It will improve our product quality, increase recovery from our existing resource, strengthen the competitiveness of our business, and also more critically, extend the life of the Sishen mine," Zikalala reported Kolomela production will continue at normal levels and Kumba remains on track to deliver full-year production guidance of between 31-million tons and 33-million tons. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE Mining Weekly put this question to Kumba: Are you planning any modernisation along AI lines? Zikalala: Great question. Firstly, I can confirm that we do have an AI strategy as a business, and, as you would imagine, some people see AI as a threat. We actually see it as an opportunity, and it's something that we're already working on in various parts of our business. We're implementing AI to assist us to improve the safety of our people in the business and I'm pleased to say that part of the reason why we can talk about the improved safety performance is due to work that our teams have been doing around AI. Interestingly, we're also implementing AI from a geology perspective and, as you can imagine, geology is very important in our business. We spoke earlier in the year about the growth in both our reserves as well as our resources, and our teams are utilising AI as we progress. Because ultimately, the significant growth that we saw from a resource base is something that we'd like to convert into reserves and actually ultimately see the extension of life at both Sishen and Kolomela. Then, secondly, from a full potential programme perspective, we are implementing AI in all the various parts of our business from a value chain perspective, touching on the mining side as well as the processing side. Pleasingly for me is that when I look at the teams that we have, it's something that we fundamentally decided we will see...