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PrintSouth Africa is set to lose its 11% share of the global silicon manganese market. Assore manganese director Jaco Venter in the conference said the loss would be a direct consequence of the decision of mining giant BHP Billiton to close its South African silicon manganese facility.
The closure decision, he said, was a direct consequence of South Africa’s electricity issues. While he expected South Africa’s market share of the high-carbon ferromanganese market to rise, he pointed out that the high-carbon market was not only half the size of the silicon manganese market but was also set to grow at a considerably slower rate than the silicon manganese market.
South Africa would thus find itself growing into a market that had less short-term growth potential.
However, given silicon manganese had always been less profitable per megawatt hour of installed plant capacity than ferromanganese, according to another insider, as a result of South Africa’s electricity prices increasing so steeply, the economics of producing silicon manganese in South Africa no longer made sense.
Rather than export manganese ore alone, the insider advocated the local production and export of manganese alloy. Venter also cautioned against South Africans becoming ore suppliers alone and predicted that China would become a substantial importer of manganese alloy in about five years’ time.
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