According to the report by CARE, India ranks fourth in terms of production of alumina and produces about 5 per cent of the world alumina. The report shows there had been an 8.4 per cent year-over-year increase in alumina production from FY 2015-16 to FY 2016-17. Some of it is consumed internally while the rest is exported. So, having said that, a good number of aluminium producers and cement and ceramic producers in India import substantial amounts of alumina for consumption.
According to the global export-import data, India’s import of alumina is rising year-on-year. In 2016, the total amount imported was 1.3 million tonnes, which in the successive year increased by 53 per cent to 2 million tonnes. This year too is likely to follow the legacy and estimated to import around 2.75 million tonnes in total, up 111 per cent from 2016 and 37.5 per cent from 2017.
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The import volume already increased quarter-on-quarter this year in Q1. The total imported amount of alumina in Q1 2018 was 600,116 tonnes, compared to 431,910 tonnes in Q1 2017. Hence, shows a growth of 39 per cent Q-o-Q. In Q1 2016, the volume was even lower at 310,866 tonnes. The graph above shows the rising trend of India’s alumina import over the past three years and also quarter-on-quarter in those years.
It is to be mentioned in this context that billionaire Anil-Agarwal-owned Vedanta alone imported some 12.69 lakh tonnes of alumina between April and August this year. Compared to this, over 3000 small and medium enterprises together imported 5.41 lakh tonnes of aluminium scrap as raw material for making aluminium. This marks higher import of alumina by Vedanta than the total amount of scrap shipped in by recyclers.
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