Geopolitical, Macroeconomic uncertainty to continue in New Year : Sunil Duggal, Group CEO Vedanta
Bhubaneswar : During the year gone by, the natural resources and mining sector witnessed a robust growth supported by uptick in the commodities cycle and rising energy transition-related demand. India became the fifth largest economy of the world, surpassing UK, with one of the best performing equity markets and is aspiring to be the ‘Electronics Hub’ of the world where minerals will play a crucial role.
This year has been marked by geopolitical crisis, supply chain disruptions, concerns over rising inflation, all while the global economy is still recovering from the aftermath from Covid-19 pandemic. The Russia-Ukraine conflict seems to have derailed the global recovery and has reshaped the global energy landscape. The geopolitical and macroeconomic uncertainty which created disruptions in the supply chain ecosystem might continue in the coming year though in the short term. Natural Resources will continue to play a critical role for building an Atmanirbhar Bhara, said Sunil Duggal, Group CEO, Vedanta Limited.
The oil and gas sector ensured the biggest impact in the past year with the crude oil prices touching its highs and then moderating in the third and fourth quarter. In the post pandemic phase, the demand for oil has risen while 2023 might witness the largest demand coming from major growing economies like China and India.
The efforts across sectors to decarbonize the economy will also increase the demand for raw materials that will boost the demand for metals and minerals. Consorted efforts are required to ensure that demands are met from the domestic markets to a great extent. Government must step up to provide additional support for project development in the near to medium term for mining sector.
Vedanta delivered a record financial year performance ending March 22. For the year 2022, we delivered on our key priorities of delivering committed volumes, timely execution of projects for growth, value addition, vertical integration & cost reduction across our key businesses, and proactive commodity price risk management and creating shareholders’ value. With healthy cash flows, we stood in strong position to further deleverage as well as service our capex requirements.
We also drove initiatives on our renewed vigor on ESG commitments as Vedanta significantly moved up in the S&P Global Sustainability Rankings (erstwhile DJSI) 2022, ranking 6th globally with a strong 14 points improvement in its sustainability score and got listed on prestigious DJSI World Index.
The company also took a notable step towards our vision of transforming the planet byscaling up RE sourcing to 1 GW, thus accelerating transition of operations to green energy and pledging towards World Economic Forum’s 1t.org of growing 7 million trees by 2030. Earlier this month, we also rolled out unique EV policy for all our employees that will lead to increased adoption of EVs amongst employees and drive the mindset change aiding India’s green mobility push for a sustainable future.
We remain well positioned, with a rich diversified asset portfolio, strong balance sheet, and cost optimization levers, to withstand dynamic macroeconomic