ET reported that JSW Steel has slightly increased production levels from its 10 million tonnes per annum Vijayanagar steel plant in Karnataka to 35% to 40% of capacity after the company secured over 1.8 million tonnes of iron ore through a recent auction of the raw material.

A senior company official said that "The situation has improved slightly. We are currently producing at about 35% to 40% of total capacity. One blast furnace and one Corex unit is operational. If iron ore movement improves, our production will also improve."

The company official said that "There are big issues related to the delivery of the auctioned iron ore, due to which we are not able to raise our production to a big extent. Delivery of the ore to us has been less than 100,000 tonnes despite JSW buying over 1.8 million tonnes in the auctions."

Citing logistics and delivery related issues, the official refused to provide a timeframe for the company to resume 100% production levels from the plant.

He said that "Yes, now we can run our plant at 100% capacity as and when the raw material reaches to Vijaynagar or at 80% capacity and keep some of it as inventory. But I can not give you a timeline right now."

In September 2011, the company had gone for a massive 70% cut in production to 30% of installed capacity due to acute iron ore shortages.

(Sourced from ET)