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Tinashe Makichi Harare Bureau
Ferrochrome producer Zimbabwe Alloys has pinned its revival hope on processing dumps at its Gweru plant after signing an agreement with a Chinese mining company, Jinan, for the provision of technical assistance on the project.
According to well placed sources, the processing of the dumps has started while talks are at an advanced stage with some potential investors to inject fresh capital into the business.
ZimAlloys which was sold to the Farai Rwodzi-led Benscore consortium for the equivalent of $10 million in 2005, was placed under final judicial management due to poor performance attributed to the closure of its four furnaces, poor global metal prices and escalating costs.
“The company realised encouraging results in dump processing and work has already started which will see the company processing an estimated 4 million tonnes of ore. Jinan is based near the operations in Gweru and they’re processing from the other side of the dump while ZimAlloys is working on the other side.
“This partnership deal is set to ease the company’s cash woes, with one of the partners expected to inject about $2,3 million. The dump processing project is expected to be complete in the next four years,” said the source.
The firm ceased operations in 2008 and was placed under final judicial management on November 27 last year after it was placed under provisional judicial management on July 24 the same year after the ferrochrome producer’s debt rose to alarming levels.
Tests were conducted by the Chinese counterparts and the metal recovery results were encouraging.
The company is focusing on strategies to build its capacity to beneficiate rather than export chrome ore in line with government policy.
Chinese companies have been heavily investing in ferrochrome for the past two years and recently Afrochine Africa completed the construction of ferrochrome smelter plant in Selous for US$25million.
ZimAlloys is expected to increase production to 400 tonnes per month with a turnover of $3 million per year by 2015.
Frantic efforts are being made towards the upgrade of Lalapanzi plant near Gweru, a move that will see the company increasing production to 7,000 tonnes per month.
ZimAlloys judicial manager Reggie Saruchera this year told our Harare Bureau that negotiations are in their final stages and the necessary equipment will soon be moved to site to begin operations.
ZimAlloys is also looking at upgrading its heavy media separation (HMS) plant at Sutton Mine in Mutorashanga.
Technical teams of partners were said to be carrying out a technical assessment of the needs at Sutton mine.
In a report that Saruchera presented at the High Court last year detailing part of the ferrochrome producer’s medium-term plans, a South African mineral processing firm Specialised Metallurgical Projects would extract some chrome metal from half of Zimbabwe Alloys’ slag dump which is estimated at four million tonnes.
Online Reporter