Main Market conditions of Metals in the previous issue on July 12, 2019

Sindicato N°2 de Supervisores y Staff, which represents more than 1,000 supervisors and employees at BHP’s Escondida copper mine in Chile, has urged members to reject the company’s final wage proposal and support strike action. Union president Alexis Barrera said the leadership unanimously rejected the offer, arguing that it failed to meet workers’ demands and required employees to perform multiple tasks. The proposal will be presented to union members this week, with voting scheduled for September 28–30. If members vote in favour of a strike, Escondida’s operations could face further labour-relations risks. The union’s current contract expires on September 30, 2026. It remains unclear whether a strike will take place or how long it could last, with the vote and further negotiations to be closely watched.

Eldorado Gold's Skouries copper-gold project in northern Greece has produced its first copper-gold concentrate, moving the mine from construction into commissioning. The site has stockpiled roughly 4.6 million tonnes of ore to feed the plant. Designed to yield about 140,000 ounces of gold and 67 million pounds of copper a year, Skouries is scheduled to reach commercial production in the fourth quarter of 2026. As one of Europe's few large new copper-gold developments, the start-up adds regional refined-copper and gold-concentrate supply amid tight global copper markets.

Vedanta's Konkola Copper Mines has resumed operations at its Nchanga copper smelter in Chingola, Zambia, after more than three months of maintenance and rehabilitation, the company said on 21 September. Built at a cost of US$350 million and commissioned in 2010, Nchanga is one of Zambia's largest copper processors with annual capacity of 311,000 tonnes. The shutdown was initially scheduled for 60 days but extended to 106 days after detailed inspections found additional critical work; the refurbishment cost about US$40 million, the first major overhaul in eight years. The plant cast its first copper anode after restart. KCM produced 80,215 tonnes of copper in 2025, and Vedanta targets annual output of 300,000 tonnes by 2030. The restart supports Zambia's goal of lifting national copper production to 3 million tonnes by 2031 from 890,346 tonnes in 2025.