Anglo American Platinum has started a consultation process that could lead to the loss of up to 420 managerial and supervisory jobs at its Rustenburg Platinum Mines subsidiary in South Africa, it said.
The proposed restructuring would include the consolidation of mines with adjacent concentrator operations – the Tumela mine, Dishaba mine and Amandelbult concentrator will be consolidated and redesigned into the Amandelbult operation and the Mogalakwena mine and Mogalakwena concentrator into the Mogalakwena operation.
The regional functional centres in Rustenburg, Amandelbult and Polokwane will be closed and their functions incorporated into the adjacent operations and corporate office. The company expects the 60-day consultation process to end on August 22, it said in a statement.
“The proposed redesign takes into account the financial difficulties in the PGM industry and is a continuation of Anglo American Platinum’s value-driven strategy,” it said. “It aims to improve the company’s financial sustainability by aligning the support structure with the proposed reconfiguring of operations into large, more efficient mining complexes benefitting from increased scale and less complexity.”
Anglo American previously said that it hopes to raise up to $4 billion through sales of several assets including the Rustenburg and Union operations, which are excluded from today’s restructuring announcement.
Platinum output at Anglo American rose 50 percent in the first quarter to 536,000 ounces from 357,000 ounces in the first quarter of 2014.
Output at its Mogalakwena mine climbed 13 percent to 100,000 ounces year on year although operations there were hit by five-month strike that ended in June last year. Total lost production in the first quarter from the strike was around 185,000 ounces.
Rustenburg produced 106,000 ounces, Union 32,000 ounces and Amandebult 81,000 ounces in the first quarter. For the full year, the company aims to produce a total of 2.3-2.4 million ounces of platinum.
(Editing by Mark Shaw)
The post Anglo American Platinum considering 420 job cuts appeared first on The Bullion Desk.
No comments:
Post a Comment