Copper mine production in the Americas will average 4.7% YoY growth over the coming five years, driven by a pipeline of significant projects in copper-producing heavyweights Chile and
, Fitch Solutions has projected.
"In Peru, there are multiple projects expected to come online in the next five years as well, including the
expansion of Toromocho, owned by Chinalco, and
Anglo American's Quellaveco mine. The latter will have the capacity to produce 300kt per annum. Between both Chile and Peru, we see combined absolute copper mine production growing by 1.5mnt through 2023," it stressed.
In this sense, "we estimate that copper mine production in the Americas will average 4.7% y-o-y growth over the coming five years, driven by a pipeline of significant projects in
copper-producing heavyweights Chile and Peru."
Fitch Solutions sees Ecuador, Panama, and Brazil —three countries less known for their
copper production— to begin playing a more relevant role over the coming years, supporting regional production growth and diversifying some production risk away from Peru and Chile.
"The former two countries are newer entrants to the space with Ecuador becoming a hot spot for investment following favorable regulation and tax changes in recent years while Panama has one behemoth copper mine that came online in February 2019," it said.
"Due to the low base effects in Ecuador and Panama, annual average production growth will come in at 84% and 36% respectively over 2019-2023, and we estimate the combined production from these two countries to reach 540ktpa by 2023," it stated.
Peru and Chile are expected to average 6% and 4% growth respectively, however, absolute production increases in both countries are going to be the major driver of growth within the Americas, Fitch concluded.