Abstract: As the existence of chromium related spinel ores may cause serious wear on the pipe and autoclave during the pipe transportation and high pressure acid leaching procedure， it is necessary to remove the chromium containing minerals from the nickeliferrous laterite ore from Ramu， Papua New Guinea. The main problem in the beneficiation of chromite in the Ramu project is that the w(Cr₂O₃):w(FeO) of chromite concentrate is merely 2.3， which can not meet the standard of metallurgical chromite product. This paper presents the results of detailed characterization of process mineralogy and magnetic separation of rough chromite concentrate obtained from tabling separation procedure of the Ramu project. The screen classification and purification tests show that the w(Cr₂O₃):w(FeO) of the rough chromite concentrate could be further enhanced by eliminating the fines and other gangue minerals. The magnetic separation of the +0.074mm rough chromite concentrate increased the w(Cr₂O₃):w(FeO) to 2.59 with 63.89% recovery of chromium.

Key words: laterite, chromite, process mineralogy, magnetic separation, enrichment