JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The report on Monday by Johannesburg Stock Exchange- and A2X-listed Merafe Resources shows ferrochrome production to be edging back up maginally.

Ferrochrome is a key ingredient of stainless steel and China, which has been introducing new cost-efficient capacity, continues to dominate global stainless-steel production, accounting for more than 63%.

Merafe’s attributable ferrochrome from the Glencore Merafe Chrome Venture in the third quarter ended September 30 was 76 000 t, resulting in an increase of 2% in production for the nine months, compared with the prior comparative period to the end of September last year.

This production increase is primarily attributed to all operating smelters being in production throughout the winter months.

In the nine months to September 30, Merafe’s attributable ferrochrome production has totalled 230 000 t, compared with 225 000 t for the same period in 2023.

Mainly on higher realised chrome ore prices and a weaker rand:dollar exchange rate, Merafe on August 12 reported a profit of R720-million for the six months to June 30, but also that ferrochrome prices remained strained and cost increases were continuing to put pressure on margins.

Merafe’s revenue and operating income are primarily generated from the Glencore Merafe Chrome Venture, which has a total installed capacity of 2.3-million tonnes of ferrochrome a year.

Headed by CEO Zanele Matlala, Merafe shares 20.5% of the Glencore Merafe Chrome Venture’s earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation from the venture, its reportable segment being the mining and beneficiation of chrome ore into ferrochrome and the extraction of associated minerals.

South Africa, once the mainstay of global ferrochrome production, today supplies most of the chrome for its stainless steel production, which represents a beneficiation reversal caused mainly by the high electricity prices charged by Eskom, an enterprise owned by a State which preaches beneficiation but does not practice it.

This is reflected once more by the Glencore Merafe Chrome Venture having to commence a Section 189 consultation process at Rustenburg smelter, which was idled from September 2023 in response to deteriorating market conditions. During this period, various options were evaluated, however, none could be implemented without eroding value.

With Lydenburg smelter still on care and maintenance, and Rustenburg, which has been idled, the Glencore Merafe Chrome Venture plans on producing ferrochrome at all its remaining smelters, given the conclusion of the negotiated pricing agreement with Eskom,

South Africa’s chrome value chain once provided more than 200 000 jobs. However, jobs have been progressively shed as South Africa’s ferrochrome industry, the beneficiation baseline of the chrome value chain, went into deteriorating decline.

South Africa has a lion’s share of global chrome ore reserves and was once not only the number one chrome ore producing country but also the world’s biggest ferrochrome producer.

In the past, 100% of metallurgical grade chrome ore was beneficiated locally.

At one stage, 20% of mining-related foreign exchange was earned from ferrochrome sales.

If the world did not have ferrochrome and was not producing stainless steel, the replacement cycle of everything that is stainless would be so much quicker, which means that far more use would be made of steelmaking coals, along with far more use of carbon-based reductants in producing pig iron and carbon steel, rendering the additional carbon added to the atmosphere being significant.

It that way, ferrochrome is key in helping the world to decarbonise, with South African ferrochrome helping to enable a considerably slower replacement cycle.