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Mining Weekly reported that Kumba Iron Ore (JSE:KIO) has cut 1,772 jobs following the closure of its Thabazimbi mine, in Limpopo in an attempt to survive the low iron ore price.
Mining Weekly reported that Kumba Iron Ore (JSE:KIO) has cut 1,772 jobs following the closure of its Thabazimbi mine, in Limpopo in an attempt to survive the low iron ore price.
As quoted in the market news:
Out of a previous complement of 572, only 221 permanent and fixed-term employees remained at head office, with the 351 head office jobs cut by the Anglo American group company in the first quarter representing a 61% reduction and a saving of R200-million a year.
A 31% reduction of permanent and fixed-term employees is under consultation at Kumba’s Sishen and Kolomela iron-ore mines in the Northern Cape as part of a Section 189A legal process, which will cut permanent and fixed-term employees by 261 people, reducing the employee complement from 846 to 585.
Kumba’s closure of its Thabazimbi mine, in Limpopo, will cut permanent employees by 800 and fixed-term employees by 360, taking the total job cuts carried out so far by the JSE-listed company to 1 772.
In presenting 61% lower headline earnings for the six months to June 30, Kumba CEO Norman Mbazima said that more than 200 individual cost-cutting measures undertaken in the six months to June 30 had reduced controllable costs by R1.8-billion. The company was now targeting a decreased break-even cash iron-ore price of $45/t, a far cry from the $135/t averages of 2013.