BNC seeks to recoup nickel production deficit

BINDURA Nickel Corporation (BNC) says it will focus on recovering the nickel concentrate production deficit and managing costs for the remainder of its fiscal year ending March 31, 2023.
This comes as the nickel miner recorded a 25 percent decrease in nickel concentrate production to 1,918 tonnes, for the first half of the 2023 fiscal year, which ended September 30, 2022, from 2,553 tonnes produced during the same period in the prior year.
The decline in production during the half-year was mainly due to the head grade of 1,03 percent, which was 18 percent lower than for the six months to September 2021.

“The company’s production performance has been negatively impacted by a decline in the footprint of the high-grade massive resource, which necessitated a rapid transition in the mining model from a low-volume, high-grade strategy to a low-grade, high-volume strategy,” chairman Muchadeyi Masunda said in a statement accompanying the group’s results.
“Unfortunately, the transition is behind schedule due to a delay in the delivery of new underground mining mobile equipment, which is a prerequisite to the realisation of the new mining strategy.
“The delay in the delivery of equipment was due to disruptions in the global supply chains as a result of the protracted effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and the ongoing geo-political tensions related to the Russo-Ukraine conflict.”
Masunda highlighted that the equipment recapitalisation programme will have a positive impact on the ore volumes the company can produce and the rate of underground development, thus addressing the grade challenges, and ultimately the cash flows generated from operations.
He said the ore milled for the period, at 230,248 tonnes, was five percent lower than the 241,325 tonnes milled in the same period last year, due to lower mined volumes.
Nickel sales volume at 2,146 tonnes was lower than the prior year’s sales of 2,549 tonnes, while the average LME nickel price was 40 percent higher at US$25,542 per tonne from the previous year’s price of US$18,233 per tonne, reflecting the global increase in nickel prices.
“The price of nickel, which was initially forecast to be US$21 000 per tonne for FY2023, has of late been on an upward trajectory, reaching the US$29 000 per tonne mark.
“The average LME nickel price is forecast at
US$21 700 per tonne in the second half of FY2023 and is to be above US$23 000 per tonne in the calendar year 2023.
“Should this higher price continue to obtain into the near future, the company will be able to significantly recover from some of the financial losses incurred to date,” Masunda said.
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