KHUJAND, August 31, 2009, Asia-Plus  -- Open joint-stock company, The Adrasman Ore Refinery, is expected to undergo fundamental modernization process within the next two years, the enterprise director general Barot Karimov said in an interview with Asia-Plus.

According to him, they are currently conducting negotiations with the Tashkent Design Institute (Uzbekistan) on developing the mine rehabilitation plan.

“This work may take some six months and the modernization process will last for two years,” the director said, noting that modernization will allow increasing annual ore productions to some 700,000 tons.

More than 560 people currently work with the enterprise that now produces up to 30,000 tons of ore and 500-600 tons of concentrate per month, which is equal to the 1991 level.  “This year, we plan to produce 250,000 tons of ore and next year, we plan to increase the ore productions to 350,000 or 400,000 tons,” Karimov said.

Established in 1967, the Adrasman ore refinery is engaged in mining and processing of lead ore for producing the lead-silver concentrate.  The plant’s rated capacity is more than 650,000 tons of ore a year.

The ore refinery was purchased by Kazakhstan’s KazInvest-Mineral in July 2006 for 11 million somoni.

Under an agreement concluded between KazInvest-Mineral, which assumed the 100 percent ownership interest in the or refinery, and Kazakh company North Time this year, 74 percent of shares in the ore refinery were transferred to North Time.