ANTIC: Zijin plans to increase the production at Bor three to four times

Serbian Minister of Energy and Mining Aleksandar Antic pointed out today that the agreement signed in Beijing with the company Zijin was important for RTB Bor, because it will create 5,000 jobs and turn RTB Bor into the biggest producer of copper in this part of Europe.

– I deeply believe that this is a very important agreement, which will secure a long-term stability of RTB Bor, considerable investments, an investment of USD 1.26 million, plus USD 200 million to settle RTB Bor's debts. All this put together is a serious framework within which RTB Bor will develop, open new mines, primarily Cerovo, modernize the existing mines Majdanpek, Veliki Krivelj, Jama, modernize the floatations and modernize and increase the capacities of the foundry and the sulfuric acid factory – Antic told Tanjug.

– The business plan of Zijin is very ambitious. They plan to double the production from the current 40,000 tons of copper from their own concentrate within three years, and to increase the production three to four times within six years. Without any doubt, this means that we can expect new jobs – the minister says.

Antic emphasizes that this will bring considerable income and profit to RTB Bor, which is very important for Serbia and all its citizens, as Serbia remains the owner of 37% in RTB Bor. After having RTB Bor generate serious losses for decades, we will now have the situation where the company will operate with profit and 37% of this profit will be paid to the budget of Serbia.

– From having to cover RTB Bor's debts, we will now have a profitable company, which is a dramatic change for Serbia, which will influence the GDP, the entire industry, especially eastern Serbia, which, I believe, now has a healthy company that will be the backbone of this part of Serbia thanks to this agreement – he said.

Antic said that several meetings had been held with a large number of Chinese companies which are already Serbia's partners or are already developing project here.

– We had a meeting with CMEC, which is building a new block at the Kostolac power plant, which is the biggest energy project in the past three decades, and they are interested in new projects. We primarily discussed that fact that it is very important for Serbia to have the block completed within the deadline and to be connected to the network by the end of 2020. The company's president gave us a promise that everything will be realized with quality and within the agreed deadline – Antic said.

He added that they had also talked to Power China, the partner in the construction of the heating pipeline from Obrenovac to Belgrade.

Ministarstvo rudarstva i energetike Republike Srbije

Zijin Mining Group Co Beijing

Serbia Zijin Copper doo Bor

CMEC Beijing

Powerchina China

Ministry of Mining and Energy

Aleksandar Antic

Zijin

RTB Bor

Cerovo mine

Majdanpek mine

Veliki Krivelj mine

Jama mine

Cmec

Power China