Over September 24-October 7, daily production of iron ore concentrates in total among China’s 186 mining companies under Mysteel’s bi-weekly tracking declined to the lowest since March 20 2020, or down for the third survey period by another 11,000 tonnes/day or 2.3% in two weeks to 475,600 t/d, partly with power rationing on some mining and concentrating facilities, according to the latest release.
The latest weekly survey data has been delayed from October 8 because of China’s National Day holiday over October 1-7, and in the latest survey period, these miners’ concentrating capacity utilization rate, thus, fell to the lowest since March 20 2020 too, reaching 60.9% as of October 7 or down for the third fortnights by 1.4 percentage points.
Iron ore miners and concentrating plants in many regions such as Northeast and East China blamed power rationing for the disruption to their normal operations, a Shanghai-based analyst shared.
“Iron ore suppliers in Northeast China posted steepest drops in their iron ore output, and most concentrating plants were propelled to cut or halt their production with limited raw iron ore supplies, as most of the regional iron ore miners had to cut down on mining with power rationing,” he elaborated.
Northeast China, with the highest longitude, has faced serious power and coal supply shortage recently, and with winter coming in mid- or late October in the region, the local authorities have been busy tackling the matter to guarantee power and central heating supply in winter months, as reported.
As for East China, “although miners and concentrating plants have been able to resume production since October 1 now that power rationing has eased, some local miners have opted to conduct maintenance on the facilities during the National Day holiday, which has resulted in notable declines in regional iron ore concentrates output,” the analyst added.
Heavy rain and flooding in North China’s Shanxi in the past few days, however, have not further declined the local iron ore output much, mainly as many underground iron ore mining operations in Daixian of Shanxi have been on suspension since June 10 after a fatal mining accident, he highlighted.
Lower iron ore output saw stocks of iron ore concentrates at these surveyed companies dropped to a new low since August 27, or down 112,200 tonnes or 7.1% in two weeks to 1.5 million tonnes as of October 7, or having ended the gain since August 27, according to Mysteel’s data.
Written by Lea Li, liye@mysteel.com
This article has been published under an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and SteelMint.
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