BNamericas quoted Mr Luiz Carlos Miranda president of the Sindipa union as saying that Usiminas is about to restart one of the blast furnaces at its Ipatinga plant in Minas Gerais state, which has been halted since December 5th 2008.

Mr Miranda said that "I spoke with four furnace operators that were invited by a company contracted to start working on the furnace as of July 10th 2009." He added that a blast furnace usually takes 15 to 20 days to restart.

Concerning 400 workers that could be laid off at Ipatinga, Mr Miranda said that he was confident they would keep their jobs, partly because the operation is in the midst of a 30 day freeze on firings ruled by a local court.

He added that "It was agreed that before laying workers off, Usiminas would meet with the Sindipa union to discuss the criteria for dismissing employees. Since they have not said anything so far, we strongly believe there won't be any layoffs."

(Sourced from www.bnamericas.com)