The Herald cited Mines and Mining Development Minister Mr Winston Chitando as saying that government has granted Chinese stainless steel giant Tsingshan a special grant to iron ore mining rights in an area around Chivhu, Mashonaland East Province, to enable the company to set up a stainless steel manufacturing plant. The development would require significant increase in key feed stock minerals namely iron ore, nickel and coal. Fortunately, this comes amid an investor stampede, which will make capital available to expand output. Minister Chitando, speaking during his official opening address at Mine Entra 2018, said the Chinese firm had already begun conducting feasibility studies into the possibility of the stainless steel project. This follows a framework agreement Government signed with Tsingshan in June this year.
The stainless steel plant, Minister Mr Chitando told delegates at the conference, would result in an investment of over USD 1 billion and would generate annual export revenue in the order of USD 2 billion annually.
This is expected to drive expedited progress towards President Mnangagwa’s vision 2030 of making Zimbabwe a middle income country. Minister Chitando said the vision “was achievable and would be achieved”. The mining sector — given that Zimbabwe has all of the 40 top minerals in the world among them gold, platinum, diamonds, nickel, chrome and coal — would play a key and strategic role to the realisation of the vision 2030. Mining currently contributes 12-16 percent to Zimbabwe’s gross domestic product.
He said that “In June 2018, Government signed an agreement with a company called Tsingshan, the largest producer of stainless steel in the world. The whole idea is that they are undertaking a feasibility study to produce stainless steel in Zimbabwe. For those familiar with production of stainless steel, the main ingredient is iron ore, which we have plenty of and have given them or Government has awarded them a special grant for iron ore.”
He added that other ingredients required in the production of stainless steel were nickel, ferro-chrome and coke, all key inputs which the country had in abundance in various parts of the country. He said that “The agreement we signed in June is a framework agreement for Government to facilitate Tsingshan to have these resources and produce stainless steel. The thumb suck number I have is that the stainless steel plant on its own will generate revenues of over $2 billion per annum.”
He further added that there would be significant value addition benefits from the establishment of the stainless steel plant given that currently Zimbabwe exports all its ferro-chrome, from Zimasco and ZimAlloys and nickel from Bindura, to markets in Europe and China in semi processed state.
source: The Harald |
