TEHRAN (Dispatches) - Managing Director of National Iranian Copper Industries Co (NICICO) Ardeshir Sa’ad Mohammadi has said that the country discovered new copper reserves of nearly 528 million metric tons to become the world’s seventh largest holder of such reserves.
Sa’ad Mohammadi said that more reserves could be found in the near future enabling Iran to push behind Indonesia in terms of copper reserves’ size.
Currently, Iran holds 4.2% of the global reserves, Sa’ad Mohammadi said, adding that new copper findings had been reported in the Southeast and Northwest of country.
This, while Iran had the 9th largest reserves of copper in 2011 totaling around 32.5 million tons.
Iran has already earned billions of dollars from exports of different metals despite a series of illegal US sanctions targeting the industry since May 2019.
The official said the major copper reserves, located in provinces of Kerman and East Azerbaijan, would serve more than 100 years of output at current production level.
He added that Iran plans billions of dollars of new investment in the industry in the next 10 years.
The NICICO chief said, however, that four new copper smelters are due to open in Iran to add nearly 150,000 tons to the current capacity for production of copper concentrates.
Iran produced 1.1 million tons of copper concentrates last year (ended March 19), while copper cathode production topped a quarter of million tons in the same period.
The official said figures recorded last year were unprecedented, adding that cathode production is planned to reach 300,000 by March 2022.