April 17 (Reuters) - Katanga Mining Ltd KAT.TO , a unit of Glencore Plc GLEN.L , on Wednesday named Glencore Coal's chief development officer Jeff Gerard to the top job, taking over from Danny Callow.
The appointment comes less than two months after Glencore, the world's biggest supplier of seaborne coal, said it would limit annual coal production capacity to current levels of about 150 million tonnes after discussion with its investors.
Gerard will take over on May 2 and will also serve as the head of Glencore's assets in the Democratic Republic Of Congo (DRC) and oversee its Mutanda mining operation in the country. is home to almost 60 percent of the world's supply of cobalt, a mineral expected to be in increasing demand for batteries used in electric vehicles.
Glencore mines about a quarter of the world's cobalt, with most of its output coming from Congo. It plans to ramp up total production of cobalt, mostly from the Katanga and Mutanda mines in DRC, to about 57,000 tonnes in 2019 from 42,200 tonnes last year, the company said in February.
However, a U.S. demand for documents in July related to Glencore's assets in DRC as part of a corruption and money laundering probe had weighed on investor sentiment.
Gallow, who took over as CEO of Katanga in January, had worked for over 12 years in Glencore's African copper operations and played a key role in developing its copper assets in DRC.