Zambia's Chinese-owned Chambishi Copper Smelter has resumed
partial copper production after some workers started reporting for
duty Tuesday following fruitful talks with management, a union
official told Dow Jones Newswires Wednesday.
At least half of the company's 500 workers reported for work
Tuesday following talks between union representatives and
management, mediated by government, Sikufela Mundia, the President
of the National Union of Miners and Allied Workers said.
"Things have started normalizing, and workers started reporting
yesterday (Tuesday)" he said.
According to Mundia, union representatives will start labor
talks with management next week over the pay dispute.
The 150,000 metric-tons-a-year copper smelter halted output
Wednesday last week, after workers went on strike, following a
series of other strikes at Chinese-owned copper projects in the
country over a pay dispute.
Zambia's labor ministry convened urgent talks at the plant
Monday to end the impasse. The plant treats copper concentrates
from Chambishi Copper Mine as well as from Barrick Gold Corp.'s
(ABX) Lumwana Copper Mines, in the North Western province.
Workers at the smelter want their salaries increased to put them
on a par with their counterparts at other smelters in the country,
such as Vedanta Resources PLC's (VED.LN) Nchanga Smelter and
Glencore International AG's (GLEN.LN) Mufulira Smelter.
A spate of workers strikes have hit Zambia's copper mining
sector since last month's election of Michael Sata as president of
Africa's top copper producer. Sata, a strong critic of Chinese
investments in the country, campaigned on populist manifesto,
promising to improve miners conditions and hike mine taxes.
Chambishi Copper Smelter is a joint venture between China
Nonferrous Metals Co. (8306.HK) and the Yunnan Copper Group
(000878.SZ). The two companies are implementing expansions at the
smelter to increase its annual capacity to 250,000 tons of
copper.
-By Nicholas Bariyo, Dow Jones Newswires;256-75-2624615
bariyonic@yahoo.co.uk