Zimasco scales down operations

an average of 15 000 tonnes a month.
At its peak in 2007 Zimasco produced 210 000 tonnes of high-carbon ferrochrome a year and nearly all of it along the mineral-rich Great Dyke, accounting for about 4 percent of global ferrochrome production.
“The ongoing global economic crisis and lower than expected levels of economic activity affecting the world’s key regions of Europe, US, Japan and China, which are the markets for Zimasco’s products, have resulted in lower prices and reduced off-take for most  commodities, inclusive of ferrochrome,” Zimasco said.
Zimasco said that it had put in place initiatives to re-align the company’s operations with global market changes and to safeguard its viability. 
“These initiatives are aimed at ensuring that the company effectively weathers the current challenges, and, more importantly, restructures the business to a cost platform that will result in its products being competitive in the global marketplace on a sustainable basis,” said the statement. “All these actions, notwithstanding global market conditions, are aimed at returning the company to full capacity utilisation in the shortest possible time.”
Zimasco is the country’s largest ferrochrome producer and a significant player on the global market.  The latest move is bound to raise eyebrows in the wake of reports that Zimasco recently suspended buying chrome ore from small-scale producers. 
Zimasco is owned by Sinosteel Corporation, a Chinese conglomerate with a controlling stake in the firm. It could, however, not be established how the decision to slash operations would affect the labour force.