(Reuters) -India’s steel-to-power conglomerate JSW Group will invest 26 billion rupees ($301.2 million) to set up operations at two copper mines, the company said on Monday, foraying into mining non-ferrous metals as steel prices fall.
The billionaire Sajjan Jindal-led group has won two blocks of copper mines in the eastern mineral-rich state of Jharkhand from Hindustan Copper for a period of 20 years, with the option to extend it for another decade.
“Venturing into non-ferrous metals, particularly copper, is a strategic move,” said Parth Jindal, the managing director of JSW Paints and the IPO-bound JSW Cement.
Steel production in India has been hit by low prices, weak demand from top consumer China and cheap Chinese steel flooding domestic markets — the effect of which has led to the group’s flagship firm JSW Steel missing profit estimates for the past four quarters in a row.
With the expansion, JSW Steel will directly compete with Vedanta, Hindalco, Hindustan Copper and Adani Copper – all of which currently dig up the brown metal used to make cables and wires.
Once ramped up, the mines will have a copper ore capacity of 3 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) and are expected to be part-operational in the second half of the fiscal year 2027, the group said in a statement. ($1 = 86.3290 Indian rupees)
(Reporting by Hritam Mukherjee in Bengaluru; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala and Savio D’Souza)
