Thursday, March 15 2018 19:31

ArmInfo. The Ambassador of the  People's Republic of China to Armenia Tian Erlong and the Minister of  Energy and Natural Resources of Armenia Ashot Manukyan discussed  today the issues of intensification of trade, economic and investment  ties between the two countries, paying special attention to the  project of building a copper smelter in Armenia. The press service of  the department reports.

Discussions on this topic have been underway for a couple of years.  Chinese investors proposed a joint project in which the large  Armenian company VallexGroup, which operates the Teghut copper-  molybdenum deposit, the polymetallic deposit in Drmbon (Artsakh) and  the Alaverdi Metallurgical Combine, participates. From the Chinese  side, we are talking about the participation in the project of the  company MCC Overseas, and, possibly, China National Building  Materials Group Corporation, Sinoma International Engineering. With  the Chinese partners, the Armenian government is also negotiating in  the direction of setting up enterprises for the production of cement,  glass and pearlite materials.

The plans for the construction of a copper smelter in Syunik region  first appeared in Armenia in 2005-2006.  An office was set up, which  began to work out concrete calculations. Then the total cost of the  project was estimated at $ 200-250 million. The processing capacity  of the plant was to be 60 thousand tons per year.  According to  experts, the new plant would allow processing all the copper  concentrate produced in Armenia. The implementation of this project  could revive the machine-building and machine-tool industries of the  economy. According to the project, the plant was a unique project,  using the technologies of processing copper concentrate by  hydrometallurgical method, which excludes emissions of harmful  substances into the atmosphere. With the onset of the global  financial crisis, the project was suspended.

Meanwhile, as the Russian press reports, the main place of melting  copper concentrate from Armenia in the 2000s was Bulgaria (where the  smelter of the German metallurgical concern is located). China's  share 4 - 5 years ago was relatively small (within 20%), but in  subsequent years it began to grow. In 2015, deliveries to Switzerland  and Spain ceased and slightly increased to Serbia (where the Bor  Mining and Metallurgical Complex, one of the largest in the region,  opened in the spring). China actively buys copper concentrate from  all over the world.

The Armenian government established an interdepartmental group last  year to discuss issues related to the provision of assistance to the  Armenian Copper Program CJSC, which is part of the VallexGroup  structure, in the design work for the construction of a new copper  smelter.