JSW Steel plans to ramp up manufacturing capacity

JSW Steel Thursday said it has plans to increase its manufacturing capacity to 44-45 million tonnes per annum by 2030 from the present 19 million tonnes. "We have plans for our Vijayanagar Works unit, where already work is on to take the capacity from 12 MTPA to 13 million (by August 2019), and on our drawing board we are preparing how we can build this unit for 18 MTPA (by FY 22)," JSW Steel Deputy Managing Director Vinod Nowal said. Speaking to reporters here, he said, the Vijayanagar plant has the potential to grow up to 23-24 MTPA, becoming the largest steel producer at a single location in the world, in the years to come, with the availability of more iron ore. "Likewise JSW Steel has plans to go for 44-45 MTPA by 2030, this is part of expansion plan," he added. According to company officials, JSW Steel is the largest producer of steel in India, with a capacity of 19 MTPA. The largest contributor to the company's overall capacity is from its plant at Vijayanagar in Ballari district in Karnataka, which is about 12 MTPA. There were plans to increase capacity at various other plants like Salem, Dolvi, Chattisgarh, Odisha, Nowal said adding it had a plan to build a total 5-8 million tonne steel capacity abroad, at its plants in the US and Italy. Noting that JSW Steel has implemented Total Quality Management (TQM) at its Vijayanagar Works steel-making unit as part of its journey towards quality excellence, the company officials said, TQM implementation has enabled JSW Steel, over the past five years, to drive operational efficiency and strengthen its customer service operation. In October 2018, JSW Steels's Vijayanagar works unit were awarded the highest global quality honour, "The Deming Prize", for its TQM practices. The company now intends to implement TQM across all its steel manufacturing units, the officials said adding that TQM implementation at its Salem Works in Tamil Nadu is on track and its implementation at Dolvi Works in Maharashtra is expected to be completed by 2020. Stating that India is rich in iron ore, whether it is Odisha, Chattisgarh or Karnataka- there are good reserves, Nowal in response to a question, urged that the government has to formalise the policy properly. "..there is no meaning (in)-we should not use our iron ore. Whatever iron ore we have today, their requirement will be for the next 20-25 years. After that whatever steel is there will get recycled, and then the dependence on iron ore is going to be reduced," he said. Noting that when there is iron ore in India, and there was no need to import it, Nowal said, "we are importing because of lesser production." Referring to the situation in Ballari as an example, he said "...requirement of the industry is 32 million tonnes, production is 28 million, and there is a shortage of 4 million, which is being sourced from outside Karnataka like Odisha or imports. I can say it is very funny when we have so many reserves." There is a need for more and more exploration, more mining, so that industries come and there are value additions, instead of importing or bringing from other states, he added.