|
 Mining
and metallurgic industries
of Kazakhstan
|
Mining is the leading branch of industry in Kazakhstan
and one of the most important for Kazakhstan as
it adds 4% to its GDP. "Mining complex is still
a significant part of our economy," Deputy
Prime Minister and Ex-Minister of finance, Mr. Pavlov
said.
The republic contains large reserves of chromium,
gold, tungsten, copper, lead, and zinc. It also
possesses great quantities of coal, petroleum,
and natural gas. The value of mineral extraction
increased in the 1990s, contrary to other sectors
of the economy. The increase is attributed to
a decision to invite foreign participation in
developing the country's mineral wealth. In exchange
for permission to operate Kazakh mines, the foreign
companies were to invest in upgrading equipment,
deal with social and ecological problems, and
increase production.
During the first six months of 2000 production
output in mining industry increased by 22.7% compared
to the corresponding period of 1999. The production
growth was secured by increasing rates of the
processing industry is one of the key sectors
of the Kazakh economy.
Since 1997, a number of tax incentives and preferences
have been put in place for investors in this area.
In parallel, the government import policy has
been aiming to protect domestic producers and
markets. In 2000, the governmental Import Substitution
Programme for the light and food industries was
approved, thus setting a favourable investment
environment in this sector.
As a result, sustained growth has been seen in
the processing industry over recent years, with
production increasing by 17.4% in 2000. The development
has been especially evident in metallurgy and
metal working, the food industry, and in petroleum
refining.
In 2000, the processing industry's output totalled
835.8 billion tenge, which was 46.5% of the overall
industrial production. The sector employs 391,000
people, or 60% of the industrial workforce.
The mining industry also experienced growth in
iron ore and non-ferrous metals extraction, as
well as production of their concentrates, chalk,
natural sand, gravel and broken stone.
The numbers of products of non-ferrous metals
industries in Kazakhstan - the cooper, of course,
zinc, aluminum concentrate. Among all the non-ferrous
metal, which are produced in Kazakhstan, of course,
the cooper is on the first place. Among the non-ferrous
metals companies, operating and located in Kazakhstan,
KazakhMys is the biggest one. "We are paying
from 4 % to 6 % from the total amount of taxes
in Kazakhstan. If we talk about the export volume
of Kazakhstan, it was around 9 billion US dollars
last year and about 6 % to 7 % (800 million US
dollars) has been done by KazakhMys," Mr.
Kim, General Manager of KazakhMys said.
"We have wire road plant, which is quite
big. It is almost the biggest in the former USSR.
We have a cable plant now. Nowadays we are trying
to expand our activities throughout the Eastern
Europe - to former Yugoslavia, Russia. We are
looking for an opportunity of buying a small cable
plant or plant, producing cooper pipes or some
spare parts for the heating systems, construction.
We are doing that along with the developing of
mining and metallurgical complex, which is our
own one not only in Kazakhstan, but also in Russia,"
he said.
At the moment China is becoming one of the biggest
potential markets for exporters like KazakhMys.
From year to year we are increasing the total
export to China on 5 % to 10 %. But KazakhMys
is mostly exporting its products to Europe. And
the value of the market share of export to Europe,
covered by KazakhMys, is up to 20 %. That means
our cooper is well known in Europe.
Kazakhstan has vast organic and non-organic mineral
deposits, which are the raw materials for the
manufacture of a variety of chemical and petrochemical
products. The country produces synthetic fibre,
chrome compounds, calcium carbide, plastics, a
wide range of technical rubber articles, etc.,
and is home to a large complex that processes
phosphorite ore into yellow phosphorus, mineral
fertiliser and synthetic detergents.
Most of the republic's manufacturing, refining,
and metallurgy plants are concentrated in the
north and northeast. In south-central Kazakhstan,
the most important industrial centers are Shymkent
(chemicals, light industry, metallurgy, and food
processing), Almaty (light industry, machine building
and food processing), and Zhambyl (chemicals,
machine building, and food processing).
Last years the growth was observed in metal mining
(which accounts for over 1/3 of the overall industrial
production), in the production of natural gas, non-ferrous
metals, crude oil and associated gas, as well as
iron ore. However, the production of coal and lignite
experienced some decline. The Pavlodar and Karaganda
oblasts, which produce 96% the country's coal, started
experiencing a declining trend in coal production
since 1990.
In the manufacturing industry, which comprises over
50% of industrial production in Kazakhstan, production
growth was reached due to the increase in production
rates in ferrous metallurgy industry (134.7% increase),
manufacturing of paper, pasteboard, and printed
products (109.2%), the textile and sewing industry
(107.8%), the chemical industry (104.1%) and in
non-ferrous metal production (103%). In 1999 the
production and distribution of power, water and
gas fell by 4.9% compared with 1998. |
124.9%
of the previous year production index with 185.7
billion tenge-the overall amount of industry line
production , ferrous and non-ferrous metallurgy
contributing 58.1 and 100.7 billion tenge respectively.
As for ferrous metallurgy there 1.4 times increase
was observed, primarily due to increasing rates
of ferroalloys, flat iron and steel rolling metals
production, which constitute over 80% of the industry
line output. Major product types: cast iron, pig-iron,
specular cast iron, ingots and other semi-manufactured
items from iron, non-alloy, stainless or other
alloyed steel, tin, zinc-coated rolled metal,
pipes, ferroalloys, etc.
In
the field of non-ferrous metallurgy 17.5% increase
was observed due to the growth in production rates
of molybdenum (2.9 times), beryllium (2 times),
copper and tin alloys, (1.6 times), lead, including
secondary refined lead (1.5 times), refined copper
(14.5%) and cupric oxide (11.6%).
The
steel industry is an old industry. Kazakhstan
trades with 65 countries, among them the biggest
partners are China, Russia, Iran, European Union,
Turkey, South East Asia, etc.
Kazakhstan has one of the largest metallurgical
institutes situated in this place, which produces
approximately 1000 of metallurgists per years. "If
a father is a metallurgist, then it is likely that
his son will be a metallurgist. In this part of
the world, metallurgy is still a passion for its
people," Mr.
N.K. Choudhary, General Director of IspatKarmet
considers. IspatKarmet is a biggest in Kazakhstan
steel plant.
"Today we produce 5 mln. tones of crude steel
and 3.8 mln. of stainless steel," the head
of Ispat Karmet said. The success story of the industry
is the success story of one company. " The
L.N.M group came to Kazakhstan at the end of 1995.
We have completed 7 years in Kazakhstan. The L.N.M.
group has celebrated its 25 years. It is a very
young group and none of the groups have grown as
fast as the L.N.M group. It started in Indonesia
25 years ago, selling 25 thousand tones of steel
and now they are selling 25 mln. tones of steel.
Today we are the second largest steel company in
the world. We are the only global steel company.
We operate in 11 countries. Our success of the last
7 years is also thanks to the support of Kazakhstan
government. On the top of it, the people of Kazakhstan
appreciate this company very much," Mr. Choudhary
tells.
The
chrome industry of Kazakhstan began its development
during Soviet period. In 1939 on the basis of
Western Kazakhstan reserves of chrome, Donskoi
Mining Plant was built. The next step was the
construction of the Aktubinsk Ferro-metals Plant
in 1943. This plant was specializing on the production
of all kinds of ferro-metals. Further development
of this sector was in 1960s - 1980s. Another plant,
which was built in Pavlodar, Ermakovskiy Plant,
at first specialized in ferro -celicium and then
moved to ferro-metals. During Soviet time, all
the ferro plants of Kazakhstan were part of one
USSR ferro industry. Previously mentioned Donskoi
Plant became a basis for the development of the
chrome industry in Russia.
Year
1995 was the year when Kazakhstan chrome industry
took its origins. At that time Kazkhrom was organized.
It included Donskoi Mining Plant, Aktubinsk Ferro-metals
Plant, and Aksuiskiy Plant. Besides, one more
factory was built in Aktubinsk, which was in the
same chemical industry but was not related to
Kazkhrom.
Today
Kazkhrom is number two in exploration and extraction
of reserves and number three in the world after
two South African companies in exploration and
production ferro-metals. Besides, Kazkhrom has
it own marganums refinery plant, which is not
developed yet. It can offer exploration and enrichment
of this ore as another way of development. It
has a strong demand.
According to independent and our forecasts, the
only countries that will dominate in this industry
will be South African and Kazakhstan. Due to world
crisis, many companies were not able to survive.
Mr. Ibragimov, President of Kazkhrom tells, "
The mine, Molodezhnaya, is the basis for our activities.
Since Kazkhrom was organized, we eliminated several
dangerous drawbacks of this mine. In 1996, we explored
460,000 tons of ore whereas in 2001 this figure
was 2,000,000 tons of ore. We can produce much more
than we can export. However, demand puts limit on
it. For example, deep mine Centralnaya has reserves
of 350000 million tons of ore. Today we explore
2600 million tons of ore every year. So, only this
deep mine can supply us with the or for the next
100 years. Besides, we have deep mine Molodezhnaya,
which useful life was prolonged for the next 20
years. The uniqueness of these reserves is that
the level of chrome in the ore is more than 50%."
Kazakhstan is the leader in the production of high-O3
consistency goods. The main market for the goods
is outside CIS - USA, Europe and Japan.
Kazakhstan
is rich not only in oil reserves but also in uranium.
If to compare uranium reserves with oil reserves,
the reserves of uranium are more. Kazakhstan produces
uranium titanium and beryllium. Beryllium was
completely directed to military purposes. When
there was no more need in making compartments
for weapons the need in beryllium disappeared
as well. Today beryllium is dedicated to the aerospace
industry, mostly because it is a very strong and
light material. The second feature of beryllium
is the ability to reflect neutrons. In the past
Kazakhstan also used to produce tantalum for the
aerospace industry. As soon as the need to produce
parts of rockets disappeared, Kazakhstan stopped
the production of Tantalum.
Today, KazAtomProm in charge of those materials,
it is divided in three subsidiaries. The first one
is a geological company that is searching for uranium
reserves in southern Kazakhstan. This company exists
since 1948 and is the oldest uranium company in
this industry. The second company is in charge of
uranium mining. Methods used do not produce waste.
The third company is called Ulbinsk Metallurgical
Plant, which produces pallets nuclear power plants.
Mr. Zhakishev, Director of KazAtomProm said, "We
learnt to produce peace-oriented goods. We have
orders till 2010. We are planning to increase capacity
by 30% by 2004. (…) KazAtomProm is a 100% export
company. From an economical point of view, our company
is very stable." |
