Regal Group International: Rio Tinto expects Africa to become a big player in copper's future.

Oct. 13, 2010 - PRLog -- Rio Tinto Group, the world’s third-largest mining firm has told Regal Group International that it believes Africa has the potential to play a major role in satisfying strong medium term growth in global copper demand.

"The medium term outlook is quite positive. There's a very strong picture on demand, supply looks like it's going to continue to be constrained," Andrew Harding, CEO for Rio Tinto Copper  said at a recent African Copper conference in London. "African copper will play a pretty significant part in the global future for the industry."

African copper deposits, generally of a high grade, make up about one-fifth of global resources with a better than 1.0 percent copper grade.

Rio Tinto’s Harding said it was possible for African copper output to increase from 1.2 million tonnes to around 3 million tonnes a year by 2015.

Citing falling ore grades in some of the globe’s major mines and higher operating costs and increased technical issues related to having to go to increasingly greater depths to find new deposits, Harding highlighted the importance of African production.

Regal Group International ‘s research shows that Rio Tinto owns a 57% stake in South Africa’s Palabora operation which produces about 80,000 tons of copper annually.

"Africa offers great opportunities, but also great challenges," Harding told the conference referring to factors such as governance, legislation and infrastructure.

Copper continued its bull run, reaching a 27-month high in London and New York recently.

“There’s no stopping the bullishness in the market right now and there’s this frantic buying into commodities as the dollar continues to weaken. The fundamentals are definitely improving, especially for copper,” one market analyst told Regal group International.

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