Tag: Aluminium

Business

BFIL announces acquisition of three Forging Lines capable of producing 72K Tons per annum of heavy forged products

May 21, 2024 by Mansi Praharaj 0 Comments #Aerospace, #Aluminium, #Balu Forge Industries Limited (BFIL), #Belagavi, #BFIL, #Defence, #engineering & safety components industry, #forging hammer, #forging lines, #Hammers & Presses, #Karnataka, #manufacturing of crankshafts & forged components, #Mercedes-Benz, #Middle East regions, #Mining, #OEM market, #Oil & Gas, #precision engineering company, #Railways

Hyderabad, May 21, 2024……Balu Forge Industries Limited (BFIL), a prominent precision engineering company engaged in manufacturing of crankshafts & forged components, announces the acquisition of three forging lines in a combination of Hammers & Presses capable of producing 72,000 tonnes p.a. of heavy forged products.

pic Balu Forge Industries Limited

Disclosing this in a press note issued in Hyderabad today, the company said, these newly acquired forging lines will seamlessly integrate with the precision engineering expansion taking place at its upcoming manufacturing campus in Belagavi, Karnataka thereby making BFIL an integrated one-stop solution provider for advanced machining solutions for critical industries viz. Railways, Defence, Oil & Gas, Mining, Aerospace, Defence, Aluminium & other essential precision industries globally.

The new forging unit will be seamlessly integrated with the recently acquired precision machining unit of Mercedes Benz. This will further strengthen our product engineering & increase our precision product offerings to global majors operating in the critical engineering & safety components industry with end-to-end solutions under one roof.

This forging unit includes a 16-ton closed-die forging hammer, ranking amongst the largest in the country and capable of producing forgings up to 800-900 kgs. This capacity will be further enhanced with a 10-ton closed-die forging hammer line and an 8,000-ton capacity mechanical forging press. With these facilities, it is advancing our presence in engineering critical industries viz. Oil and Gas, Aerospace, Defence, Railways, Mining, Aluminium and Auto part manufacturing and many other critical industries.

This acquisition strengthens and expands our critical engineering products portfolio and enhances R&D capabilities in alloy mixing & metal combinations BFIL informed. It provides us unique strength in creating products from different alloys based on Aluminum to Titanium which shall enable BIFL to expand its product offering to major growth industries for critical engineering products and to further capture the OEM market that we cater to across North America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East regions.

Aluminium Industry
Business World

Aluminium Industry reiterates urgency for 5% RoDTEP rate for economic sustainability

May 13, 2021 by Neel Achary 0 Comments #Aluminium

New Delhi, 12 May 2021: The Aluminium Association of India (AAI) has pushed for speedy implementation of the RoDTEP Scheme (Remission of Duties or Taxes on Export Products) for the Indian Aluminium industry on priority to survive these challenging times. In a letter to senior officials of ministries of Commerce & Industry and Finance & Corporate Affairs, AAI expressed the urgent need for at least 5% remission rate for the Aluminum Sector under RoDTEP Scheme to ensure its global competitiveness. The AAI also requested a separate budget allocation for the aluminium industry, being a strategic sector, to realize the immense potential to double Aluminium exports over the next 2-3 years.

Highlighting the urgency of the matter, the AAI said, the Government needs to notify the actual remission rates as per actual sectoral data submitted to the RoDTEP Committee. The inordinate delay in notifying the sector-wise remission rates is creating a precarious situation and a high level of uncertainty for the Indian exporters. It is adversely impacting exports due to ambiguity w.r.t. pricing of exports goods and absence of any clarity on the mechanism of duty remission/ drawback rates for exports. The situation for exporters further aggravates with the withdrawal of MEIS, as to date the exporters are unable to avail the MEIS benefit for exports already made during FY- 20 and FY- 21 (Apr-Dec) due to the blocking of the online MEIS module for applying claims.

The Commerce Ministry / DGFT are yet to notify the rates due to Government’s current situation pertaining to budgetary constraints. Union Budget 2021-22 has allocated only Rs 13,000 Cr for RoDTEP Scheme against Rs 50,000 Cr announced by Hon’ble Finance Minister in Sept, 2019. This allocation is just one-third of the Rs 39,097Cr allocated in FY-20 for MEIS (Merchandise Exports from India Scheme).

Supporting the rates calculated by RoDTEP by an extensive exercise conducted through detailed discussions, due diligence and analysis done for various sectors, AAI said that implementation of its rates will give flexibility in increasing the rate in the future based on budget allocation to increase exports without any objection from WTO.

Throwing light upon the current dilemma of the Indian Aluminium industry, it further highlights the plight of the Indian Aluminium exports struggling to retain competitiveness in international markets as compared to the major exporting countries, specially China, which extends various support measures for export competitiveness. In India, the high incidence of numerous unrebated Central & State taxes/ duties impedes the growth potential of Aluminium sector in India. The various taxes constitute ~15% of Aluminium production cost which is amongst highest in the world. This adversely impacts the sustainability & competitiveness of Aluminium industry and further renders Indian exporters vulnerable and uncompetitive vis-à-vis global players in international markets. These duties and taxes should not be exported as such and should be remitted back to the domestic producers to encourage domestic value addition and export of finished products

Under MEIS, the Aluminium exports were eligible for a 2% reward rate which itself didn’t provide ample cushion to remain competitive against the current bearish market condition. Government support is extremely crucial at this juncture to reduce the burden of high taxes/ levies with an adequate remission rate of at least 5% under RoDTEP to boost exports and survive this challenging phase.

Recognized as one of the 12 champion sectors, India has the 2nd largest Aluminium production capacity (4.1 million tons/ annum) and is the 3rd largest Aluminium producer. Huge investments of Rs 1.2 Lakh crore ($20 billion) have been made to enhance domestic production capacity to cater to domestic demand as well as enhance exports of high quality finished Aluminium products. The industry has generated more than 8 lakh jobs and developed over 4000 SMEs in the downstream sector. Aluminium exports alone contributed ~USD 5 billion to India’s Forex earning in FY-21, i.e. ~2% of India’s export basket and have massive potential to double the exports to the tune of $10 billion Forex earning in future.

mining
Business World

Sustainable Mining of Bauxite Resources Needed for India to be a Global Aluminium Hub

Oct 19, 2020 by Gouri Achary 0 Comments #Aluminium, #Bauxite Resources, #Global Aluminium Hub, #Mining

Aluminium, a metal of strategic importance for India to attain its goal of becoming a $5 trillion economy, continues to be a highly imported metal. This is despite India having the world’s 5th largest coal and bauxite reserves, both of which are important raw materials for aluminium production. This is in addition to the fact that India is the 3rd largest producer and consumer of aluminium globally with domestic demand expected to expand from current 4 MTPA to 12 MTPA by 2030.

For this, a multi fold growth in bauxite production from current levels of 20-22 Million Ton to 72 Million Tons per year is needed to meet the domestic requirement. To this essence, tapping the country’s 3.8 Billion Tons Bauxite reserves is a key step to gravitating India towards becoming self-reliant.

Import of bauxite, one of India’s most abundant ores, has caused an estimated forex loss of over 400 Million dollars in the last 5 years alone and caused missed opportunities of generating mass scale employment. Bauxite mining creates livelihood opportunities in regions which otherwise have limited potential for other economic activities. Opening of a single Bauxite mine has the potential to generate over 10,000 livelihood opportunities and can garner over Rs. 5,000 crores to the State revenue over the life of the mine.

Aluminium is of strategic importance and is a critical raw material in defence, transportation, electricity, aerospace, automobile, consumer durables and many more sectors. It is an essential commodity for various other industries / SMEs due to its critical role in diversified applications. With huge Investments of over Rs. 1.5 Lakh crores the sector creates over 20 lakh direct and indirect jobs and has developed over 4000 SMEs (Small and Medium Enterprises in the downstream sector.

“It is a travesty that even with such abundant bauxite reserves and available aluminium capacity for value addition in the country, no Metallurgical Grade Bauxite Mines have been successfully auctioned in the last 5 years since inception of MMDR Act 2015 forcing the domestic industry to import.

The eco-friendly and sustainable mining methods lead to economic, social and environmental harmony. Thus, utilizing India’s natural bauxite dividend should be a policy priority to realise the vision of an AatmaNirbhar Bharat,” said Ansuman Das, Former Chairman and Managing Director, NALCO and metals & mining expert.

The abnormality of the arbitrary determination of Average Sale Price (ASP) of Metallurgical Grade of Bauxite linked with the selling price of the end-product Aluminium has led to various state governments being unable to auction the bauxite mineral blocks as the present system of Bauxite ASP Calculation will make the production of Aluminium unviable in the country. Additional and planned investment of over Rs. 50,000 crores in the Aluminium sector has been put on halt as it has been deemed futile in the current Bauxite Average Sale Price regime.

Indian Aluminium producers have introduced sustainability measures to restore land that has been mined to a natural and economically usable state for rehabilitation and livelihood. Land with rich bauxite reserves is mostly barren and uncultivable. After the mined-out area is reclaimed by backfilling of the top layer soil, the surface is brought back to the original ground level and then becomes cultivable.

Today, the mining commitment includes extensive re-greening of the mined land and proactive participation in the socio-economic development of communities around. There are significant opportunities to implement technology-driven scientific mining techniques in bauxite mining in India as most of India’s bauxite reserves are located on a single plateau making bulk open cast mining possible.

The time is now right to try and resolve the Bauxite Average Sale Price issue by aligning it to bring it in line with other bulk minerals, auction the available Bauxite Mines and fully utilize the potential of the domestic Aluminium Industry to become self-reliant, save precious foreign exchange which will lead to creation of wide range of employment opportunities locally while yielding rich socio-economic dividends for all stakeholders.