The sharp rise was because Korea Nickel Corp, South Korea's only nickel refinery, raised its imports to meet local demand as it had halted production for two months until mid August due to maintenance of its old plants, traders said. The company said in late September it would produce only 20,000 tonnes of refined nickel this year due to the production halt and would import 15,000 tonnes instead.

Traders said rising domestic demand for refined nickel this year also contributed to the bullish imports. Among the total imports in January- October 1999, a third or 11,938 tonnes of refined nickel were from Australia in the same period, up 90 per cent from a year earlier, KOTIS data showed.

The country imported 8,356 tonnes of refined nickel from Canada in the period, up 144 per cent from a year before. Itsrefined nickel imports from Russia were up only nine per cent year-on-year to 6,910 tonnes for the first ten months of this year. South Korea imported 21,375 tonnes of refined nickel for the full year of 1998.

Korea Nickel's local sales in Jan-Oct
Korea Nickel sold about 30,000 tonnes of refined nickel in the domestic market, up 36 per cent from a year ago in line with a rising economy, a company official said.

But he said the company sold refined nickel under long term contracts and its local sales changed just slightly from quarter to quarter, depending on buyers' stock conditions and factory operation rates.

Korea Nickel, which sells about 90 per cent of its output to Pohang Iron and Steel Co Ltd (POSCO) sold 8,900 tonnes of refined nickel in the first quarter, 8,750 tonnes in the second and 8,600 tonnes in the third quarter, another official told Reuters.

The company said late September that it was expected to sell 35,000 tonnes of refined nickel in the local market this year and plannedto sell a similar level on the domestic market in 2000. Korea Nickel has an annual capacity of 32,000 tonnes of refined nickel.

Little impact from Inco's force majeure
Korea Nickel has seen little impact by force majeure from Inco Ltd, the western world's largest nickel miner, as it imports small amount of raw materials to produce nickel for plating from Canada's Inco, a senior company official said.