JSE-listed Kumba Iron Ore’s sales for the six months ended June 30 increased 1% to 21.3-million tonnes, while export sales increased 2% to 19.9-million tonnes, ultimately reflecting an improvement in rail performance, which allowed the miner to meet sustained demand.

During the second quarter of the year, however, shipments were hampered by severe weather disruptions and repairs to a stacker reclaimer at the Saldanha port, resulting in export sales decreasing by 4% to 9.8-million tonnes, relative to the sales of 10.1-million tonnes in the prior quarter.

Operationally, production decreased 11% year-on-year to 20.1-million tonnes for the six-months to June 30, but good progress had been achieved in the second quarter, with production having increased 11% quarter-on-quarter to 10.54-million tonnes.

This, Kumba said last week, was largely driven by a 13% quarter-on-quarter improvement in Sishen Iron Ore’s production to 7.31-million tonnes.

At Kolomela, production decreased 11% quarter-on-quarter to 3.23-million tonnes, owing to extended maintenance of the dense-media separation plant.

Kumba further noted that it had continued to focus on its value-over-volume strategy, in line with the strong demand for high-quality iron-ore, adding that the average lump to fine ratio was maintained at 68:32 and the average iron quality of the product portfolio was stable at 64.3% iron.

These factors contributed to the higher average realised free-on-board export iron-ore price of $108/t.

Moreover, Kumba said its mining activity had delivered a solid performance and that, although waste stripping at Sishen had decreased, as planned, by 4% to 82.8-million tonnes, the primary mining equipment performed well during the second quarter with increased levels of availability.

Full-year waste stripping guidance currently remains unchanged at between 170-million tonnes and 180-million tonnes.

Given the unscheduled plant maintenance in the first half, production guidance for the full-year has been revised downward to between 42-million tonnes and 43-million tonnes, compared with the previous guidance of between 43-million tonnes and 44-million tonnes.