Vedanta's aluminium biz to focus on backward integration; bring to operation 2 mines in FY23

Vedanta's aluminium business, which has not been impacted majorly by COVID-19, would focus on backward integration in the next fiscal and would bring into production two of its mines in Odisha to provide raw material security for its plants, a top official of the company said. The CEO of Vedanta's aluminium business Rahul Sharma in an interview with PTI said that in the coming financial year, the company's "focus would be on backward integration".

"Second is the raw material. We have some mines.We would like to operationalise one or two mines so that our raw material security becomes captive raw material...We see them (Jamkhani and Radhikapur coal mines) coming into operation next financial year," Sharma said.

The expansion of the company's alumina refinery from the current 2 million tonnes per annum to 5 MTPA is going as per the schedule, he said further.

"We are expanding our refinery which is alumina, which is an intermediate product, from 2 to 5 million tonne ...That is going as per the schedule," the CEO said.

On the metal side, the capacity of Vedanta's group firm Balco will increase from 0.56 million tonne (MT) to 1 million tonne (MT).

Sharma further said that to cater to sunrise sectors like electric mobility, renewable energy and aerospace, the company is expanding its portfolio in terms of value-added products like billets and alloys.

"Nothing has been hampered. Rather we are on track from the product side, expansion side, backward integration side, value-added products," the CEO said.

Vedanta Aluminium currently produces one of the largest ranges of aluminium and its value-added product offerings. The company is a leading producer and exporter of aluminium billets.

Vedanta Aluminium Business, a division of Vedanta Limited, is India's largest manufacturer of aluminium, producing half of India's aluminium at 1.97 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) in FY'21.