Manganese ore is emerging as a strategic vulnerability for India’s steel expansion, with the country importing about 60-65 per cent of its requirement even as steelmakers target capacity of 300 million tonnes per annum by 2030. The exposure is not simply a mining-sector concern. It connects the future of construction, manufacturing and infrastructure delivery to the availability, price and processing of a mineral that is essential to steel quality.
India’s steel capacity currently stands at 222 million tonnes per annum, according to Manish Sarda, Deputy Managing Director of Sarda Metals & Ferro Alloys. The industry has access to substantial iron ore and coal reserves, but remains dependent on overseas supplies for ferro alloys, particularly manganese. The main sources of imported manganese ore are South Africa, Gabon and Australia.
Manganese is used in steelmaking to remove impurities and improve strength, toughness and wear resistance. Its importance is expected to grow as steel companies focus on producing higher-quality steel. That creates a supply question beneath the headline capacity expansion: India may be able to increase steelmaking capacity, but the expansion will also require a more secure and predictable flow of the minerals that determine the performance of the final product.
The immediate challenge is not a reported shortage of manganese alloys. India has adequate capacity to produce manganese alloys, is meeting domestic requirements and also exports some of its output. The pressure point is manganese ore, the upstream resource on which that alloy production depends. Sarda described the future availability of ore as the larger concern, particularly if major producing countries increasingly develop domestic downstream processing and retain more value within their own economies.
This possibility changes the nature of India’s import dependence. At present, imports provide access to material that domestic mining and exploration do not supply in sufficient quantities. But if supplier countries such as South Africa, Ghana, Gabon and Australia give greater priority to domestic value addition, Indian producers could face a tighter market for ore. The supplied material does not establish that such a disruption has occurred, but it identifies a strategic risk for an industry planning significant expansion.
The domestic mining system presents a second problem: the price paid for access to mineral resources does not necessarily guarantee that those resources will enter production. Sarda pointed to manganese mines in Odisha that were awarded at premiums of about 140 per cent, describing such levels as difficult to sustain economically. A mine awarded at a high premium may become commercially unviable, and the eventual surrender of the lease can leave the country with neither the expected production nor the revenue anticipated from the auction.
This exposes a gap between auction success and actual mineral supply. A high bid can signal intense competition among companies seeking raw-material security, but it does not automatically mean that extraction will begin at a viable cost. The distinction matters for steel planning because a mine that remains undeveloped contributes nothing to domestic supply, regardless of the premium recorded at the auction stage.
The issue is also linked to the qualifications and incentives of bidders. Companies are competing aggressively for resources because they want greater control over raw materials, but the government must balance that demand with the practical ability of a successful bidder to develop and operate a mine. Sarda suggested that authorities could examine actual users and their qualifications more closely while assessing participants in mining auctions.
One approach discussed in the source is a public-private partnership model in which mining begins and the price of ore and the mechanism for sharing profitability are determined using international ore indices. Such a structure, as described by Sarda, could bring greater transparency to pricing and offer companies more raw-material security. It would also shift attention from the one-time auction premium to whether a mine can produce consistently, sustain operations and support downstream industry.
The larger resource challenge is that India has not undertaken enough deep exploration for high-grade mineral ores such as manganese and chrome, according to Sarda. These resources are concentrated in certain States, making the quality and distribution of geological information especially important. Without adequate exploration, the country cannot accurately assess the size, grade or commercial potential of its mineral base, and policymakers cannot build a reliable production strategy around resources that remain poorly understood.
The government has the institutional infrastructure and capability to undertake exploration, Sarda said, but deposits need to be explored to a stage at which they become viable and commercially saleable. The present market appears uneven: some proven resources attract very high premiums, while other areas receive very low premiums and limited interest. That pattern suggests that discovery alone is not enough. Geological certainty, operating economics, environmental safeguards and downstream demand must come together before a resource becomes a dependable source of supply.
Environmental requirements add another layer to the cost and feasibility of mining. Sarda said mining must be carried out systematically and responsibly, with safeguards for ecology and the environment. He also acknowledged that carbon-related requirements and stricter mining regulations could raise costs, while arguing that these requirements are necessary. The policy challenge is therefore not to remove safeguards in pursuit of faster extraction, but to make resource development economically viable within those safeguards.
The same tension is visible in the steel industry’s response to the European Union’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, or CBAM. Sarda described CBAM as a challenge during the transition and said companies that adapt faster to the new requirements would be better positioned. For Indian steel and ferro-alloy producers, competitiveness will increasingly depend not only on securing ore but also on how that ore is converted into products with a lower carbon footprint.
Sarda Metals is investing in solar and hydropower and is seeking to reduce emissions through waste-heat recovery and the utilisation of waste gases. The company has taken up a ₹300-crore expansion plan at its Vizag plant for waste-heat recovery and waste utilisation. It is also considering solar and hydropower projects in the northeastern States and Chhattisgarh, although some of those investments remain at the discussion stage.
These measures point to a broader change in the industrial infrastructure required for steel and alloy production. Raw-material security, energy security and carbon performance are becoming connected parts of the same production decision. A company may have access to ore but still face pressure from energy costs or carbon-related trade requirements. Conversely, lower-carbon operations cannot fully resolve vulnerability if the mineral input itself becomes expensive or difficult to obtain.
For India’s construction and infrastructure ambitions, the manganese question is significant because steel expansion is expected to support a wide range of urban and industrial activity. The source does not provide a forecast of how manganese prices or availability will affect specific projects, and it does not establish an imminent supply disruption. It does, however, show that the planned increase from 222 million tonnes per annum of steel capacity to 300 million tonnes by 2030 is dependent on supply-chain decisions beyond iron ore and coal.
The evidence therefore points to three linked requirements: deeper exploration to establish India’s mineral resource base, mining auction structures that prioritise viable production rather than headline premiums alone, and operating models that provide transparent pricing while maintaining ecological safeguards. The public-private partnership proposal is one option raised by an industry representative, not an announced government policy.
India’s manganese ore challenge is ultimately a test of whether industrial capacity planning is being matched by resource planning. The country has the ability to produce manganese alloys and meet current domestic requirements, but it remains substantially dependent on imported ore. As steel capacity expands and supplier countries pursue more domestic value addition, the next phase of policy will need to determine how much of the mineral base can be explored, developed and produced domestically, and under what economic and environmental conditions.
