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Johannesburg - South Africa's gold production in January 2009 was 8.7% lower than in January last year, while the country's
total mining production for January fell 11% year on year, Statistics South Africa reported on Thursday.
Non-gold production tumbled 11.4% in January this year when compared with last year's January production figures.
Statistics South Africa said the decrease in total mining production for January was largely attributable to negative contributions from diamonds (-6.2 percentage points), platinum group metals (-2.3 percentage points) and chromium (-1.1 percentage points).
According to mining production and sales data for January, total mining production for the three months to end January 2009, after seasonal adjustment, decreased by 10.7% compared with the previous three months.
The main contributors to this decrease were platinum group metals (PGMs)(-5.7 percentage points) and diamonds (-3.3 percentage points).
Total mining production for the three months ended January 2009
decreased by 8.7% compared with the three months ended January 2008.
Despite the general fall off in production across commodities due to production cutbacks and weakening commodities demand and prices in the latter part of the year, Statistics South Africa said mineral sales increased for 2008.
The total value of mineral sales at R20.3bn was 33.5% higher
in 2008 compared with 2007.
This increase in the value of mineral sales followed increases of 15.9% in 2007 and 35.5% in 2006.
Major contributors to the annual increase in 2008 were coal (12.4 percentage points or R27.8bn), manganese ore (6.1 percentage points or R13.8bn), PGMs (5.8 percentage points or R12.9bn) and iron ore (3.9 percentage points or R8.8bn).
The total seasonally adjusted value of mineral sales at current
prices for the fourth quarter of 2008 reflected a decrease of 10.9% compared with the previous three months.
This decrease of 10.9% (R8.6bn) can be largely attributed to a
decrease of 15.8% (R10.8bn) in non-gold mineral sales.
- I-Net Bridge