[mine Annual report] Nickel production and sales volume of South32:2020 fell 1% in fiscal year compared with the same period last year.

SMM7, March 21 / PRNewswire-FirstCall-Asianet /-recently, when South32 released its fiscal 2020 results, South32 CEO Graham Kerr said, "our top priority is still to keep our employees safe and healthy, maintain reliable operations and support our community through the COVID-19 pandemic."

Despite the health crisis, we have achieved excellent operating results, as highlighted by the annual production records of alumina in Brazil, Hillside Aluminium and the Manganese Mine in Australia.

We continue to see good demand for our products, with sales exceeding production in most of our business. Looking ahead, we will continue to focus on reducing controllable costs, managing counterparty and supply chain risks, and optimizing working capital to ensure that the business remains resilient during potentially large fluctuations and falling commodity prices.

According to the report, the company's nickel production in fiscal 2020 was 40.6 kilotons (kt), down 1 percent from last year's 41.1 kilotons, while nickel sales were 0.6 kilotons (kt), down 1 percent from last year's 41.2 kilotons.

Output summary:

Production guidance:

Cerro Matoso department

Cerro Matoso's nickel production payable fell 1 per cent (or 0.5kt) to 40.6 kt in fiscal year 20 as the plant achieved higher plant utilization and production, partially offsetting the planned lower ore feed grade.

While our productivity is not affected by Colombia's response to the COVID-19 national blockade, we are still monitoring the impact of restrictions on the movement of people and equipment, which has delayed our planned refurbishment of large furnaces.

As previously reported, this work has been rescheduled to half a year in December 2020 (previously in the June quarter of 2020), so the production guidance for FY21 is now expected to be 33.5kt (previously 37.4kt).

In the June quarter of 2020, sales fell by 2%. Our Ferro Nickel products are sold at L or M + 1 benchmark prices with reference to LME Nickel Index prices and attract expanded product discounts in the current market.

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