SA Bulk Exports
SA's bulk export volumes rose by 4.3% year-on-year in February to 15.5 million tonnes, from a revised 54.6% (88.8%) surge in January 2018 to a record 20.8-million tonnes (25.4 million tonnes), data from the Transnet National Ports Authority (TNPA) showed on Monday
TNPA said there was an error in the formula calculation for iron ore in January 2018, which had been corrected in February 2018. Bulk exports excluding Saldanha were up 25.6% in the first two months of this year, to 21 million tonnes.
In January bulk exports out of Richards Bay, which is mostly coal, saw a 28.6% jump to nine million tonnes, while bulk exports out of Saldanha, which are mostly iron ore, saw a massive 90.6% surge to a revised 10.2 million tonnes (14.8 million tonnes).
This may in part be due to the shift in the Lunar New Year from January last year to February this year, so Chinese steel producers front-loaded their February iron ore and coal imports into January as steel production curbs, that were imposed during the winter months to ease pollution, were lifted in February.
In February bulk exports out of Saldanha fell by 17.7% to 5.2 million tonnes due to the above seasonal effect, while bulk exports out of Richards Bay grew by 19.1% to 8.9 million tonnes.
Bulk exports out of the other ports such as Durban and Port Elizabeth rose by 45.2% in January to 1.6 million tonnes and were up 30.7% to 1.5 million tonnes.
Source: BDpro