South Africa’s mining production decreased by 10.1 percent year-on-year in August 2014, Statistics SA said on Thursday.
The largest negative growth rates were recorded for platinum group metals (PGMs), -45 percent, diamonds, -30.2 percent, and other non-metallic minerals, -24.1 percent.
The main contributors to the 10.1 decrease were PGMs, which contributed -11.6 percentage points, and gold which contributed -1.1 percentage points.
Seasonally adjusted mining production decreased by 3.1 percent in August 2014 compared with July 2014.
This followed month-on-month changes of 1.6 percent in July 2014 and -1.1 percent in June 2014.
Seasonally adjusted mining production decreased by 1.1 percent in the three months ended August 2014 compared with the previous three months.
The main contributor to the decrease were PGMs, contributing -1.6 percentage points.
Iron ore was a significant positive contributor, contributing one percentage point.
Nedbank said on Thursday that the decrease in production illustrated that the industry was suffering from the effects of the five-month-long platinum strike earlier this year.
“While the impact of the strike will abate as the year progresses, activity is likely to remain lacklustre partly as a result of the seasonal decline related to the December holidays,” it said in a statement.
“Mining figures are volatile and have little influence on policy decisions in the short term, but the persistent weakness will continue to hurt GDP [gross domestic product] growth.”
