CISA Advises Controlling the Amount of Iron Ore Import

BEIJING, Aug. 5 /Xinhua-PRNewswire/ -- China Iron & Steel Association said
the traditional price mechanism has suffered greatly because of the this
year's negotiations. In CISA's mid-year report, it said the 2008 negotiation
for price of iron ore
( http://www.tootoo.com/w-Minerals_Metals_Materials/22000000-1-/ ) is facing
lots of difficulties and disadvantages, because there are two different prices
and two kinds of ocean freights in the iron ore import business, in addition
to a great demand for iron ore.
(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080605/CNTH022LOGO )
A CISA official said, "The fast increase of price and ocean freight has
threatened the smooth development of China's steel and iron industry. What
should we do to solve this problem? We should make long-term countermeasures.
At present the best method is to control the amount of ore import, thus to
control the fast increase of steel and iron."
CISA has advanced three suggestions to restrict the fast increase of iron
ore. One of them is to encourage steel companies and district companies to
look for more potential mines and increase production, because there are lots
of unexploited mine resources in China. Some of them are not exploited because
of the low prices.
Separately, mineral information in Tootoo.com ( http://www.tootoo.com/ )
demonstrates that the manufactured iron ore production has increased about 34
million tons in the first half year, it not only satisfies the contemporaneous
requirement for pig iron increase, but there are still more than 6 million
tons left. The amount of ore import is decreasing, not increasing.
CISA also suggests that the national steel mills have to strictly control
the export of rolled steel, especially the low-end products, to moderate
export high-end products. The price inversion of the at-home and abroad steel
are raising the price of ore and ocean freights, it is also harmful for the
present situation. If the profit per ton of steel
( http://www.tootoo.com/buy-steel/ ) is 600 Yuan, China can only attain 42
billion Yuan because the annual export is about 70 million tons. The price per
ton has increased more than three hundred, so China will lose about 120
billion if we import 40 million tons of iron ore, not including the raised
ocean freight. The CISA also advises that steel mills have to improve the
steel quality and control the total amount.
SOURCE Tootoo.com

TooToo.com, +86-10-9510-5561, or fax, +86-10-6584-9900, or service@tootoo.com,
Address, 19th Floor, Block One, Majestic Towers, Gongti Dong Road, Beijing,
100020 China, Post Code: 100020