One of the major Ukrainian newspapers “Dzerkalo Tyzhnia” (“Weekly Mirror”) regards the commissioning of the ilmenite mining and beneficiation plant of the “Velta” Company as the most significant event of the 2011 year in the Kirovograd region economics. This is stated in the article published 18 February 2012.
The article states: “The most significant event of 2011 in the economic life of the Kirovograd region was undoubtfully the opening in the vicinity of the Korobchino village ( the Novomirgorod district) of the first phase of the mining and beneficiation plant for producing ilmenite concentrate – the raw material for the titanium industry.
During less than one year the Production-and-Commercial Company “Velta” built an open pit and a beneficiation plant where the ilmenite sands are deslimed and beneficiated in screw type and magnetic separators.
The annual production capacity of the facility is 185 thousand mt of the processed ilmenite concentrate. Already in the current year the enterprise plans to increase the output by one third, to mine and process 240 thousand mt; it is also planned to put into operation the second phase of the mining and beneficiation plant maintaining the same high rate of the construction work. Thus, in the nearest future the new facility in Kirovograd region will provide two percent of the world production of ilmenite”.
It is especially stressed in the article that “Velta” began financing the social sphere of the Novomirgorod district even before the production facility had been put into operation. It is stated in the publication: “The Company bought a school bus, several cars for the veterans, repaired the premises of the children’s wards of the central district hospital, rendered assistance to the local football team, invested money for repairing roads in the district”.