China’s manganese ore imports rise 38% m-o-m in Mar’26: GACC

• Strong import growth driven by smelter demand recovery
• Rising costs and supply push ore prices higher

Mysteel: China’s manganese ore imports were rcorded at 3.18 million tonnes (mnt) in March, surging by 877,296 t or 38% on month, according to the latest data released by China’s General Administration of Customs (GACC).

Manganese ore delivered by major overseas miners to China increased substantially in March, a fact borne out by a recent Mysteel survey which showed that last month, the volume of manganese ore delivered to China by the four major exporters-South Africa, Australia, Gabon and Ghana-reached 2.44 mnt, increasing by 104,417 t or 4.5% on month.

Besides, demand for manganese ore from domestic alloy smelters increased in March with the resumption of smelting after the Chinese New Year (CNY) holiday had ended on 23 February. This also contributed to the fast growth in manganese ore imports, Mysteel Global learned.

For example, daily silico manganese output among the 187 smelters under Mysteel’s tracking averaged 27,905 t/day in March, higher by 275 t/d from the previous month. Moreover, their production for March totaled 865,060 tonnes, climbing by 91,420 tonnes from February though the total was 3.8% lower than the March total last year. The 187 sampled smelters host about 99% of China’s SiMn smelting capacity.

Inventories of manganese ore at China’s major ports increased in late March as the import volume rose. By the end of March, the total tonnage stocked at the ports monitored by Mysteel reached 5.04 million tonnes, rising by 84,000 t or 1.7% on month.

China’s manganese ore prices increased significantly last month due to domestic traders’ higher import costs with the major overseas mines increasing their offers for ore.

On March 31, Mysteel assessed the price of South Africa-origin 36.5% grade Mn ore at North China’s Tianjin port at Yuan 44/dmtu ($6.5/dmtu) including the 13% VAT, soaring by Yuan 6.5/dmtu from the end of February.

For the first three months of this year, China’s total import volume of manganese ore came in at 8.93 million tonnes, jumping by 3.1 million tonnes or 52.6% compared with the same period of last year, the GACC statistics showed.