Zambia Smelter to Double Capacity to 300,000 T

LUSAKA, Oct. 20 -- Zambia's Chinese-owned Chambishi smelter plans to double processing capacity for blister copper to 300,000 tonnes in 2010 due to higher demand to use the facility by mining firms, the company said on Monday.

    The government says smelter capacity in Zambia, Africa's largest copper producer, falls short of demand for processing copper concentrate into blister copper.

    "We plan to double production to at least 300,000 tonnes of blister copper next year ... to do that we will have to expand the plant," Chambishi smelter spokesman Lewis Mulenga said.

    Foreign mining companies including Kansanshi mine, a unit of First Quantum Minerals (FM.TO: Quote) and Chibuluma mine, owned by South Africa's Metorex (MTXJ.J: Quote), recently joined Equinox Minerals' (EQN.AX: Quote) (EQN.TO: Quote) Lumwana mine in using the Chambishi smelter for processing copper concentrate.

    Zambia President Rupiah Banda said Chambishi, a joint venture of China Non-ferrous Metals Corporation (CNMC) and Yunnan Copper Industry (YNCIG), was initially treating copper from NFC Africa, another unit of the CNMC.

    The Chambishi smelter is located in an economic zone, where Zambian authorities are waiving taxes such as a 25 percent import duty, 16.5 percent value added tax and 30 percent corporate tax to attract investments from China in the Chambishi zone, about 370 km north of Lusaka.

    "The copper smelter is a major step towards the sort of economic progress that my government anticipates within the zone," Banda said when visiting the smelter on Monday.

    Banda said the smelter had created more than 600 new jobs in the mining sector, the country's economic lifeblood.

    (Source: Reuters)