Improvement in South Africa's Mining Sector

By Joel ScanlonJan 19 2011

Production in South Africa's mining sector has risen 9.6% in November on a yearly comparison. In October it had been revised to a 6.5% rise as per available statistics. This is indeed good news as the mining production was showing a negative annual growth rate at the end of May of -7.7%.

The three month period ending in November last year saw a rise of 2.6% in mining production when compared to the three month period ending in August last year. The sharp rise was contributed by a 1.8% rise in the mining production of the platinum group metals.

The South African statistic figures also show that the seasonally adjusted values of mineral sales at current prices for the quarter ending October 2010 also reflect an increase of 7.1% as compared to the quarter ending July 2010.

The value of the 7.1 % increase is placed at 5.3 billion rand of which 2.4 billion rand came from the sale of platinum group metals. Iron ore also contributed 816 million Rand and other non metallic minerals contributed 798 million Rand in the same time frame. Essentially gold, coal, and manganese ore also contributed to the value.