China's Jiangxi Copper plans to produce 700,000 tonnes of refined copper this year after making up for a production lost during an unusually harsh winter, the company's general manager, Li Yihuang, said on Wednesday.

The company, parent of listed Jiangxi Copper Co Ltd and China's largest copper producer, will be able to fully make up for lost refined copper output in the first quarter, Li said.

Unusually heavy snowfall early this year disrupted transport and forced Jiangxi Copper to briefly reduce mine and smelter operations.

Too much copper concentrate production was lost to be made up in the first quarter, but the company still expects to make up the difference during the rest of the year, he told Reuters on the sidelines of the annual National People's Congress.

"There will be no big impact," Li said.

Jiangxi Copper now produces about 38 percent of the concentrate it uses and Li said he would like to see that proportion rise above 40 percent.
Jiangxi's overseas mine investments would begin to supply copper ores in three years' time, he said. It has stakes in copper mines in Peru, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Copper futures MCU3 on the London Metal Exchange fell to $8,375 a tonne on Wednesday after touching a 22-month high of $8,661 on Monday. They are just 4 percent short of the record $8,800 high struck in May 2006.