(Company Announcement) Renowned mining consultancy, Core Consultants, published its inaugural manganese report on 2nd September 2014. The report is issued monthly and details pertinent trends in the manganese ore, alloys and steel markets.
The manganese market has benefited from a trio of “super trends”. These trends include:
- China has remained the dominant key end-user market and last year the country increased its imports by 34% y.o.y. This demand continues to be driven by urbanisation, industrialisation and infrastructure development, which despite lower GDP growth, is set to continue for the relatively long term.
- Greenfield manganese projects, with the potential for large scale high-quality manganese ore, are emerging in South Africa. In order to ensure the success of these projects, upgrades to rail and port infrastructure is underway.
- Owing to falling grades and rising power costs, emerging market players are rapidly usurping traditional producers.
However, at present the macroeconomic environment and political landscape presents new challenges for the manganese industry:
• India has a new electorate and is due to reveal its fixed investment plan for the coming five years.
• The Ukrainian manganese and alloy market is under threat.
• Europe is emerging from austerity measures.
• The USA is moving from a situation of an expansive monetary policy to a more contractionary environment.
Each of these factors is expected to have an effect on manganese production, steel demand and manganese and alloy prices.
With this in mind, Core Consultants has created the perfect guide to traverse the erratic market by producing a monthly report, authored by analysts from both South Africa and Ukraine, which keeps abreast of the latest industry developments.