India’s sole coking coal producer, Bharat Coking Coal Company Limited (BCCL), a wholly owned subsidiary of Coal India Limited, is aiming to ride the rising trend of international coking coal prices and is ramping up its own production to improve its financial health, a company official said on Wednesday, November 9.
The official said that, in view of the upturn in international coking coal prices, BCCL will need to rapidly increase its own production levels of 37 million mt per year to 51 million mt per year.
Acknowledging that higher production could not be achieved in the short term, the official said that mining volumes will start to increase from the next fiscal year and the targeted volume of 51 million mt will be achieved over the subsequent two to three years.
Anticipating that international prices will remain firm over the next few years, higher domestic production volumes will enable BCCL to replace imports by steel companies and reduce its own losses.
While it is acknowledged that BCCL has been facing financial stress and mounting losses, company officials declined to divulge the losses of the company on the grounds that it is a wholly owned subsidiary of Coal India Limited and only the latter could put such details in the public domain.
Nonetheless, BCCL will continuously monitor international coking coal prices and will consider revising its domestic coking coal prices during the remaining months of the current fiscal year, to maximize margins, the official said.