Four out of six furnaces at Assmang Limited’s Cato Ridge Works are now in ferromanganese production, following the Department of Labour’s lifting of the prohibition order on two more furnaces on Friday, 11 April 2008. The furnaces were started up on Monday, 14 April 2008.

This follows the sign-off by organised labour and the Department on independently recommended additional safety features, including the construction of blast protection walls to shield employees from the furnaces and retraining of operations staff.

The fifth furnace is undergoing a refurbishment programme and is expected to resume operations in May this year, with the sixth expected to be recommissioned in the 4th quarter of 2008.