Like many of its peers, South32 benefited from higher commodity prices and has been flexible enough at some of its operations to ramp up sales into improved prices, with manganese in SA and Australia one of the examples that have put the company in a financially stronger position at the end of 2016. "While stronger commodity prices and our significant operating leverage have enabled us to strengthen our financial position further, we continue to focus on the basics; the safety of our people and the optimisation of our operations," CEO Graham Kerr said. South32, which houses the assets spun out of BHP Billiton, most notably stepped up manganese sales on the back of higher prices. Its aluminium-related businesses had a sound performance. "We have demonstrated the flexibility of our manganese business to respond to favourable market conditions by opportunistically increasing ore production," Kerr said of the company’s mines in SA and Australia. In SA, saleable manganese ore production ...
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