Reuters reported that Japan's top copper producer has settled on 2010 processing fees with BHP Billiton Plc setting the industry benchmark for the year. Mr Masanori Okada president of Nippon Mining & head of the Japan Mining Industry Association said that BHP has agreed to treatment and refining charges of USD 46.5 per tonne and 4.65 cents per pound. Mr Okada said that "Although there are some negotiations still left with other miners, we think of this as the benchmark." Earlier this month a spokesman at Nippon Mining had acknowledged that an agreement had been reached for the 2010 processing fees with BHP, but he declined to elaborate. Copper treatment and refining charges for 2010 were first set at those levels with US miner Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc late last year. Treatment and refining charges were set at USD 75 and 7.5 cents in 2009. Mr Okada said that Japan's nonferrous metals firms cannot count on their smelting sectors any more and in our case that is why we are putting our efforts in the upstream sector. He said that other copper smelters were strengthening other departments such as recycling or electronic materials to make up for their faltering smelting divisions, once a key source of revenue for Japanese smelters.

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