Largest Mozambican industry produced 248 thousand tons of aluminum before closing

Mozal, the largest Mozambican industry, produced 248 thousand tons of aluminum in the last nine months before closing in March, 6% less compared to the same period in 2025, according to official data consulted today by Lusa. According to data from the Australian company South32, which leads that smelter on the outskirts of Maputo, in the same nine months of the previous fiscal year, Mozal had produced 265 thousand tons of aluminum. Sales, in the same period, fell 7%, from 246 to 229 thousand tons of aluminum until last March.

The drop is explained by South32, in a recent information to the markets consulted by Lusa, by the “entry of the smelter into a maintenance and conservation regime on March 15, 2026.” However, sales actually increased by 8% in the quarter ended in March 2026, precisely due to the commercialization of the “remaining stock of finished products,” in view of the planned closure. Even so, the information adds, Mozal entered the maintenance and conservation regime “exceeding the production forecast by 3%.” South32 confirmed on March 16 that Mozal, the largest Mozambican industry, has been under a maintenance and conservation regime since the previous day, forecasting a spend of 52.4 million euros with the suspension of the smelter, including the dismissal of workers. “Over the last six years, we have engaged extensively with the Government of the Republic of Mozambique, with Eskom [the South African company that buys energy from Mozambique and sold it to the smelter], and with other stakeholders, but we were unable to secure a sufficient and affordable energy supply for Mozal beyond March 2026,” said the CEO of South32 (which owns 63.7% of the smelter), Graham Kerr.

With the current regime of the smelter, one of the largest in Africa – with more than 1,000 direct workers and 4,000 indirect workers – without production, South32 expects to spend 60 million dollars (52.4 million euros), including on “contract termination,” with maintenance alone costing five million dollars (4.4 million euros) annually. “While this is not the outcome we wanted, we are proud of the history and the significant contribution that Mozal has made to the local community and the Mozambican economy in its 25 years of operation,” added Kerr, in the same information from South32. South32 previously considered the energy tariff proposed to the Mozal aluminum smelter “totally unsustainable,” thus justifying its closure, without ruling out reactivating the largest Mozambican industry if conditions change. In a previous call with Australian investors, the transcript of which Lusa had access to and which involved the presentation of the latest South32 results, the executive director explained that the “only formal offer” for energy supply by the South African utility Eskom was almost 100 dollars per megawatt-hour (MWh), when, “outside of China, less than 1%” of smelters have contracts above 50 dollars per MWh.