Anglo American’s South African subsidiary, Kumba Iron Ore has revised its production outlook for 2021 to 40-41mn mt, down by 2mn mt from its previous projection.
The miner said in a statement on Friday that it had set the 2020 production target for 37mn mt, compared with guidance ranging from 37-39mn mt previously, to avoid overstocking. Kumba has also lowered its Sishen and Kolomela mine’s output estimates by 500,000mt this year, now tallying those targets at 25.5mn mt and 11.5mn mt, respectively.
The maintenance of rail and port infrastructure undertaken by Transnet in October, has helped the company to raise its iron ore sales guidance to 39mn mt for 2020, the higher range of the 38-40mn mt projection for iron ore sales.
In its outlook for 2022 and 2023, Kumba expects steady iron ore production of 41-42mn mt each year.