The global zinc market could shift into a supply deficit as early as 2016 as impending closures at a number of larger mines tighten the grip on an already constrained concentrate market, China's Minmetals Resources CEO said in an interview on Monday.
While a number of new mine projects, including Minmetals' Dugald River slated for start-up in 2014, will help ease the burden of the concentrate tightness, the prospect of declining ore grades and the smelters' ability to process this ore, economically, could keep this year's benchmark treatment and refining (TC/RC) charge talks at a standstill, he said.
"It's (production deficit) about 4 to 5 years out," the company's Melbourne, Australia-based chief executive, Andrew Michelmore, told Reuters on the sidelines of the International Zinc Association's (IZA) 2012 conference in Rancho Mirage, California. In 2011, Teck Resources struck the annual deal at $229 per tonne with Korea Zinc, based on a $2,500 zinc price.
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