Hwange gears up for underground mining Mr Makore
Mr Makore

Mr Makore

Business Reporters
HWANGE Colliery Company Limited took delivery of its continuous miner on Sunday, which was being repaired in South Africa, as it presses ahead with plans to resume underground mining.

The continuous miner, which accounts for 45 percent of underground mining activities, had broken down over two years ago. It could not be established how much was spent on repairing the continuous miner, but in February, Hwange Colliery managing director Engineer Thomas Makore revealed that a deposit of $1 million had been paid for the repairs to start.

The payment came after the coal miner had secured a $3,2 million loan from some international financial institution to repair key equipment.

Overall, Hwange Colliery requires about $6 million to repair equipment. In a telephone interview yesterday, Eng Makore declined to reveal the total figure paid for the repairs saying: “I can’t give you the specifics because we are in closed period.”

The continuous miner was delivered in Hwange on August 13. Delivery of other key machines to help in the underground mining excursion is expected in the next six weeks.

Once all the equipment is in place, and barring any other unforeseen circumstances, production is expected to resume in the last quarter of the year.

Said Engineer Makore: “Underground mining is where we produce high value coking coal, so it will be a good addition to our product mix. It will improve our profitability and add to our volumes.”

When operating optimally, a continuous miner processes about five tonnes of coal per minute. Underground mining operations are expected to enhance the product mix offering of Hwange Colliery, thereby improving the overall profitability and quality of its revenue.

Hwange Colliery’s export quality coking coal will contribute to the company’s foreign currency revenues. Ramping up production and consequently sales, is central to Hwange Colliery’s turnaround strategy, taking advantage of the recently approved Scheme of Arrangement.

The company owes its creditors $352 million. Recently, Hwange Colliery selected a European company to conduct exploration and drilling at its new concession in the western areas of Hwange.

Preliminary reports show that the new concessions have an estimated underground resource of about one billion tonnes. Hwange’s results to June 30 last year indicate current liabilities of $311 million against current assets of $61 million.

In the full year to 2015, the over 115-year-old coal mining firm reported a net loss of $115 million.

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