Price-triggered efficiency drive sees BHP take axe to Pilbara job numbers
BHP Billiton has cut 170 jobs at its Mount Whaleback iron ore mine in the Pilbara.
BHP Billiton has cut 170 jobs at its Mount Whaleback iron ore mine in the Pilbara as part of a push by the world’s biggest miner to run its operations more efficiently amid weaker prices for the commodity.
The redundancies announced yesterday came after BHP last week cut 100 jobs at the Perth headquarters of its iron ore division, and coincide with efforts to sell its West Australian nickel and aluminium assets.
Companies such as BHP, Rio Tinto and Fortescue Metals are trying to cut costs and boost productivity with iron ore trading at almost two-year lows in recent weeks — the price of the steelmaking ingredient has fallen well below $US100 per tonne.
BHP chief executive Andrew Mackenzie admitted last week that the company had expanded its iron ore production too rapidly during the boom years, causing it to overlook the underlying growth of its overall business. However, he said that despite fears the iron ore market was facing a period of oversupply, continued demand from China would justify the recent capacity increase.
“We are very strongly competitive at prices much lower than today’s prices,” he said.
The latest job cuts at BHP are significant but still relatively small in the context of the miner’s overall Pilbara workforce of 24,000 staff and contractors.
The huge Mount Whaleback mine, established in 1968, is the world’s biggest single-pit open-cut iron ore mine. The workers affected by the cuts will be able to apply for other roles at BHP’s Jimblebar and Eastern Ridge mines.
A BHP spokeswoman said the job losses were driven by the company’s focus on delivering value to shareholders by lifting volumes while reducing costs.
“This focus on productivity is not new; it is about safely improving our business and ensuring we are a competitive, world-class operation,” she said. “BHP Billiton Iron Ore regularly undertakes reviews to ensure that our business is operating as efficiently as possible. This includes reviewing the size and structure of our workforce to ensure it supports the delivery of our productivity agenda.”
As part of its own productivity drive, Rio yesterday said its Pilbara fleet of autonomous trucks had reached a milestone of moving 200 million tonnes of material.
One of Rio’s massive 930E autonomous haul trucks moved the 200th million tonne at the Yandicoogina mine last month.
Rio iron ore chief executive Andrew Harding said Yandicoogina was the first autonomous mine in Australia and the technology brought benefits through decreased variability, improved schedule efficiency and early identification of bottlenecks.
“The autonomous truck fleet also delivers significant savings in maintenance, tyre life and fuel,” Mr Harding said.