African platinum miner Lonmin has announced a $1 million fall in annual pre-tax profits, down from $291 million last year to $290 million.

The world's third largest platinum miner added that overall turnover jumped to $1,030 million from $779 million in 2003.

However, Lonmin explained that its financial results were affected by the strength of the rand.

"The financial outcome was again adversely affected by the strength of the South African rand against the US dollar, which hits our results as our costs are overwhelmingly in rand while our revenues are wholly in dollars," Lonmin chairman, Sir John Craven stated.

In terms of production, Lonmin achieved a record primary mine platinum output of 913,263 ounces.

Looking forward, Brad Mills, the Lonmin chief executive, said that a new mine extraction plan would allow the firm to expand production by 20 per cent on 2004 levels from 2010 onwards.

"Our platinum operations are in excellent shape," Mr Mills stated. "Our mining and process engineers have developed a new mine extraction plan that will allow us to grow production from our core properties to a sustainable 1,100,000 ounces of primary mine produced platinum per year from 2010 onwards."