PRIVATE Hwange coal miner, Makomo Resources, says it expects to ramp up its production in the third quarter of this year to surpass last quarter’s figures by 50% following acquisition of new machinery.
Makomo managing director Raymond Mutokonyi told NewsDay yesterday that they were anticipating a significant jump in production levels following the recent delivery of Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe-funded mining equipment.
“The second quarter was subdued, but in the third quarter we have managed to bring in some new equipment. We foresee an upward projection because we brought in big machinery. The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) gave us the money mid of second quarter,” he said.
Mutokonyi, however, could not disclose how much money the firm received from RBZ.
“We foresee our third and fourth quarters to be good. We are projecting to surpass our second quarter figures by between 30% and 50%. During the first half of the year, we were subdued because we produced between 170 000 and 200 000 tonnes of coal, which was quite low because our market demand is much higher than that,” he said.Mutokonyi said in the just-ended second quarter, the company experienced challenges including machinery breakdowns and shortage of foreign currency.
“The biggest challenge being lack of spares. Secondly, we need to continuously replace our equipment, but we failed to do so because of the forex challenges,” he said.
Makomo has, for the past eight years, been operating in the Entuba coalfields.
Newsday
