Resumen de Kazakhstan prepares to launch country's first TiO2 project

Industrial Minerals

• Kazakhstan-based industrial materials company TOC Tenir-Logistic is planning to launch a titanium dioxide (TiO[subscript]2 ) project next year, the first of its kind in the Central Asian country. The TiO[subscript]2 plant will be fed with ore from the Tymlay titan-magnetite deposit in Zhambyl Oblast, in southern Kazakhstan.

  Tymlay's prospects were dealt a blow when a deal was signed by members of the Eurasian Economic Union, which comprises Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia, on 1 September 2016 suspending customs duties on imports of Russian TiO[subscript]2 into Kazakhstan for a period of five years.

  According to Absadyuk Mamumov, a spokesman for the Zha-mbyl government, Kazakhstan's national government is broadly in favour of the Tymlay scheme and is likely to reinstate import tariffs once Tymlay starts producing.