India’s Ministry of Steel has directed state-run manganese miner MOIL Limited to take immediate steps to increase production to the limit available under its existing environmental clearance limits, a government official said on Friday, December 17.
The directive was issued at a review meeting of the operations of MOIL Limited by junior minister of steel, Faggan Singh Kulaste, the official said.
The minister noted that, of total Indian manganese reserves of 93 million mt, MOIL had an estimated 33.16 million mt or 36 percent under its control.
MOIL produced 1.14 million mt against total domestic production of 2.48 million mt in 2020-21.
The National Steel Policy (NSP) has laid down a steel production target of 300 million mt by 2030 which will increase manganese demand to 6.5 million mt. Taking into consideration the requirement of manganese for exports of ferroalloys, the total domestic demand for manganese has been forecast at 10 million mt by 2030, the official said.
Against this, MOIL’s existing expansion plan targets manganese production of 3.5 million mt by 2029-30, leaving considerable headroom to ramp up production further factoring in the total reserves under its control, the official said.