Chinas major iron ore trading company Sinosteel Corp is reported to be considering setting up a 3 to 5 million tonne plant in Orissa, Jharkhand or West Bengal to capitalize on iron ore reserves.

Mr Hong Sen Wang MD of its subsidiary Sinosteel India Pvt told media that We are looking an investing abroad and India is our first choice because of its potential to develop into a big market. A feasibility study is on and we hope to finalize the plan by the year end. Mr Wang informed that Sinosteel may initially invest $500 million on the venture and is seeking rights to mine 5 million tonne a year of iron ore for up to two decades and that location would be decided after the feasibility study is completed.

Mr Satyajit Singh GM for resources told Reuters that the amount of investment for the plant is yet to be decided and Sinosteel could also enter into a partnership with an Indian company to set up the plant. He said that "Only in the last few months have we realized just how big the potential is for steel in India."

To provide impetus to industrialization in the state, Mr Arjun Munda led Jharkhand government has approved rehabilitation policy under the policy landholders would be made to willingly part with their land to make way for setting up industries. Mr Munda said The new rehabilitation policy will facilitate the investors to set up industries in the state. The policy is friendly to people whose lands will be acquired for industries.

As per the announcement, the displaced people can buy shares worth 50% of the price of their land to be given to a company. The government will offer land in exchange for land to displaced people and Rs.150,000 to construct houses. It also has a provision for one time compensation for the displaced people. The companies will help in the rehabilitation of the displaced people, besides providing jobs in the company. The firms will impart vocational training to displaced people so that they can be suitably absorbed in the company.

Mr Aditya Swaroop state cabinet secretary said The price for land and houses has been increased substantially by the government under the rehabilitation policy. The displaced people will get preferential shares in the industries.

Mr AK Singh state secretary for industry said that the government has set a time frame of 183 days for allotting land to the applying companies and that the focus of the package was rehabilitation before displacement.

Jharkhand government has signed MoUs with more than 45 companies in steel, mining, power and other sectors in the last two years envisaging investments of more than Rs.2.2 trillion, but the progress has been negligible due to issues related mainly to land allocation and mining rights. The combined land requirement for these projects is reported to be around 30,000 acres.

Against the backdrop of recommendations made by Hoda committee for iron ore policy and subsequent lobbying by Indian steel majors and miners, Business Standard has reported that the prime minister's office has asked the Joint Plant Committee to independently dig out iron ore statistics, probably to take the final call.

As per the BS report JPC has to study how much iron ore is purchased by steel producers, how much is held captive by them and how much iron ore lumps, fines & concentrates was consumed by local steel producers during the last three financial years.

JPC, founded in 1964 by Indian government for promotion of steel and the coordination among the main producers, is manned by officials from the steel ministry and steel producers.

Essar Steel has commissioned a 1.8 million tonne capacity slab caster at its Hazira steel plant to augment Essar Steel's annual steel casting capacity to 4.6 million tonnes from 2.4 million tonnes. Essar Constructions, an Essar group company undertook complete engineering, civil, structural, construction, equipment erection, piping, electrical and automation jobs on single point responsibility basis in record time of 14 months.

The Caster is equipped with the latest technologies such as vertical mould of special copper alloy, hydraulic mould oscillator with dynamic control, mould width adjustment, automatic mould level controller, sticker detection system, segments with dynamic soft reduction etc.

The caster is designed to cast slabs of up to 2000 mm width in 220mm/260mm thickness and length range of 4.6 meters to 10.2 meters. Now Essar will be able to offer more sophisticated grades of steel required for specialized requirements like interstitial free steel, ultra low carbon steel, API grades up to X80 and for other critical applications.

A high level delegation led by Mr Ram Vilas Paswan union minister of steel on technology assessment mission to Europe had a meeting with Mr LN Mittal president of Arcelor Mittal.

As per reports, Mr Mittal suggested that India should ban export of high quality iron ore as in the years to come it might find shortages. India has a reserve of 23 billion tonnes of iron ore of which about 1 billion tonnes was of high quality ore.

Mr Paswan concurring with him said that the ministry has already written to the Prime Minister to take necessary steps in that connection.

Indian steel tube major Welspun-Gujarat Stahl Rohren Ltd has informed that its board of directors have authorized the executive management to consider bidding for exploration blocks under New Exploration Licensing Policy - VI Round.

The lending arm of the Indian Railways, Indian Railways Finance Corporation, is planning to financing third parties interested in investing in rolling stock and will begin with the funding of the railways wagon investment scheme. For all such projects, it will go in for a tripartite agreement, in which the railway ministry will act as the guarantor.

Mr Rajendra Kashyap MD of IRFC said Railway ministry has forwarded us a list of companies who wish to be a part of the wagon investment scheme. These include mainly private sector steel and coal companies who want to have the convenience of owning their own rakes for transporting goods, but are short on funds. Mr Kashyap said that IRFC wants to have a phased investment plan, beginning with an approximate Rs 200 crore this fiscal to only 3 to 4 players this year, and depending on the success of the scheme expand operations from next fiscal.

IRFC till now has been providing market funding only for Indian Railways projects.

Indias first full fledged maritime institute is being set up in Goa spread over 500 hectares of land by Sea King Infrastructure and the leading Dutch International Maritime Transport Academy. Work on the project is expected to begin in October, with the first phase to be completed within 30 months.

The university would impart courses in regular marine engineering, port management, shipbuilding and repair, dredging operations, logistics and transport, ship chartering and management and sea farers course. IMTA specializes in short but practical international post graduate courses for port, shipping and transport managers.

In the first phase, it is expected to admit 1,200 students from more than 15 countries besides 300 faculty and support staff, which would later be enhanced to 6,000 once it begins functioning fully.

SKIL and IMTA would invest Rs 75 crore each for this Rs 150 crore project.

Punj Lloyd Ltd has announced that it has entered into a 49:51 JV with Swissport International to develop projects in the Indian ground handling in aviation sector.

Mr Atual Punj MD of Punj Lloyd said This joint venture will enable Punj Lloyd to enter into a new business field in the aviation sector in India, which has robust growth opportunities. We are enthusiastically looking forward to developing our partnership with Swissport into a very successful business. Punj Lloyd is keen to bring world class ground handling facilities in India to service the rapidly increasing passengers and growing aircraft fleet of Indian carriers".

Mr Joseph In Albon president & CEO of Swissport International said "The joint venture is a significant business opportunity that will open up new avenues for developing Swissport International's core competencies in ground handling in India and enable us to serve this market with the same high quality standards that we provide all around the world."

Reuter has reported that Orissa based Kalinga Coalmines Ltd plans to raise Rs 1.21 billion through a syndicated loan to fund a mining project in the state.

A banker told Reuters "We have just launched the syndication. The deal is virtually sold. We are awaiting a formal sanction from various banks." UTI Bank and ABN Amro Securities are the book runners for the syndication.

Privately owned Sainik Mining and Allied Services has 74% stake in Kalinga Coalmines and balance 36% with the state run Orissa Mining Corporation.

According to the Reserve Bank of Indias weekly statistical supplement, Indian foreign exchange reserves increased by $1.132 billion to total $166.458 billion for the week ended September 1. Foreign currency assets also increased by $ 1.152 billion to touch $ 159.152 billion during the week.

Italian Acciaieria Arvedi SpA announced that they are going to build the world's first Arvedi endless strip production plant for the continuous production of finished steel strip at the company's existing site at Cremona in Italy. Start up is scheduled for 2008.

The facility will produce high quality hot rolled and coiled thin strip in a wide range of steel grades in an endless process from liquid steel to rolled goods. The new single line plant will be designed to yield an annual capacity of more than 2 million tonnes of rolled steel.

Arvedi, which has employed inline strip production technology since 1992, has developed the new Arvedi ESP process in which the cast thin slabs will be immediately rolled to strip and coiled in a continuous endless process.

The line layout can be subdivided into four main plant sections. The first covers the thin slab caster with liquid core reduction and three high reduction stands at the exit of the casting machine serving for in line rolling. The downstream section comprises the induction furnace where the intermediate strip is equalized. Subsequently, the 5 stand 4 high finishing mill followed by the cooling line, allows for the rolling of strip to thicknesses between 12mm and 1mm in widths of up to 1570 mm. The fourth section consists of the high speed flying shear and three downcoilers. The line is said to have a total length of 190 meter.

Nucor Corporation announced that it has entered into an agreement to purchase substantially all of the assets of Verco Manufacturing Company for a cash purchase price of approximately $180 million, subject to post closing adjustments. Completion of the acquisition will occur after satisfactory resolution of regulatory approvals and other closing conditions. The transaction is expected to close during the fourth quarter of 2006.

Verco produces steel floor and roof decking at three locations in the western part of US Phoenix, Fontana in Calif and Antioch in Calif.

Mr Daniel R DiMicco chairman, president and CEO of Nucor said "The acquisition of Verco is an extremely attractive growth opportunity to enhance Nucor's market leadership position in steel deck and to expand our highly profitable vertical integration business model. Nucor's downstream value added businesses have consistently generated very attractive returns on assets through the economic cycle."

Nucor's Vulcraft Group is the largest U.S. manufacturer of steel deck. With the addition of the Verco facilities, Nucor's total annual deck capacity will exceed 500,000 tons. This acquisition will position Nucor with a national reach to provide US non residential construction markets with a complete package of joist and deck products.

POSCO announced that it will build a 400,000 tonnes plant to process auto grade steel at industrial complex in Altamira in Mexico and that it has signed a MoU with the state government of Tamaulipas. The new facility is slated to break ground in early 2008 and begin operations in 2009.

POSCO plans to supply its own CR required to make the galvanized and galvannealed steel. It will determine a suitable plant site around the end of this month and will set up a local business arm by the year end.

Mexico hosts plants from major automakers like General Motors, Toyota, Volkswagen and around 1,000 parts suppliers. It is also close to the southeastern part of the United States where GM, Nissan, Hyundai Motor and Mercedes Benz roll out about 2.2 million cars every year. The region's annual supply of galvanized steel sheets for cars is only 300,000 tons while demand in Mexico and the southeastern US amounts to 1.6 million tons. Through the Mexico plant, POSCO can avoid US trade regulations due to the North American Free Trade Agreement, which was signed between the US, Mexico and Canada in 1992.

EU's highest court European Court of Justice has rejected appeals brought by Sumitomo Metal Industries, Nippon Steel Corp, Dalmine and Salzgitter Mannesmann and has backed fines imposed by the European Commission against them for operating a steel tube cartel between 1990 and 1995.

EC had fined Euro 99 million in December 1999 to MannesmannrohrenWerke AG, Vallourec SA, Corus UK Ltd and Dalmine SpA, Nippon Steel, Sumitomo and 2 more Japanese companies for cartel activity. The Commission found that the cartel had been operated between 1990 and 1995 by the European and Japanese firms under the codename "Europe-Japan Club". The Commission found the producers had colluded to restrict themselves to their domestic markets and not compete against each other, a serious breach of European antitrust rules.

6 of the 8 companies appealed the decision to European Court of First Instance in July 2004, which partially annulled the commission's decision and reduced the fines to Euro 86.2 million. The companies and their fines after the adjustment were.

Sumitomo, Nippon, Dalmine and Salzgitter Mannesmann further challenged that ruling, each arguing that the commission had violated legal procedure in some way.

Mergerstat reported that an Egyptian steel company Attaka has agreed to acquire the state's 82.13% stake in Suez Steel Co for approximately EGP1.1 billion ($191.7 million). It is expected that EGP800 million ($139.4 million) to be paid toward the company's debt and EGP300 million ($52.3 million) would be paid directly to state owned Banque du Caire.

Under the sale agreement, the buyers must agree to buy all the shares owned by minority shareholders at the same price as they pay for the government's stake.

Suez Steel was set up in the industrial zone in Suez province in 1997 and started production in 2000. It has a production capacity of 600,000 tons of steel billets a year, using scrap metal and pellets of direct reduced iron.

Novolipetsk Steel's net profit under US GAAP rose by 13% YoY to $943.8 million in the first half of 2006. NLMK's revenue grew by 9% to $2.601 billion. Its gross profit equaled $1.152 billion down by 5% YoY and operating revenue reached $925.3 million down by 16% while EBIDTA fell by 19% to $993.3 million.

NLMK's Q2 net profit shrank decreased by 27% to $397.9 million as compared to Q1 of 2006 although the revenue was up by 30.2% to $1.478 billion.

Ms Galina Aglyamova CFO of NLMK said The successful implementation of NLMKs strategy of maintaining and further increasing companys profitability, together with the improvement in the steel market, resulted in high profit margins. EBITDA margin in H1 2006 amounted to 38%. NLMK maintains one of the highest EBITDA margins in the global steel industry. Stable cash flow from operating activities ensures the Companys financial flexibility within the framework of corporate strategy. During the reporting period, important steps were taken to implement NLMKs vertical integration strategy. Prokopievskugol, a producer of high quality coking coal, and Altai-koks, the largest independent coke producer in Russia, were acquired in the first half of the year. As a result of these acquisitions, NLMK currently covers more than 100% of its current requirements in coke and 50% in coking coal. The company has substantially strengthened its raw materials base, which is crucially important for maintaining the companys sustainable growth.

Handan Groups listed entity Handan Iron & Steel Co has decided to buy part of the parent's assets including a medium plate mill, power plant, thermal plant and transportation department.

Baosteel, the second largest shareholder, has not participated in the voting for the stake purchase and seems to be supporting this move.

The plate mill with designed capacity of 800,000 tonnes per year has commenced commercial production in May and is expected to produce 420,000 tons of plates in 2006.

A Chinese consortium consisting of state owned China National Machinery & Equipment Import & Export Corp and Export Import Bank of China has signed an agreement with Gabonese government for investment of $3 billion to develop Belinga iron ore reserves in Gabon Republic in West Africa after winning the sole rights in June to exploit untapped iron ore reserves. The consortium plans to begin work next year and complete it in 3 years.

Belinga iron ore reserves are in remote forest hills 500 kilometers east of Libreville on the Atlantic coast and have proven reserves of more than 500 million tonnes. The consortium would sell all iron ore from the mine to steel mills in China.

The project includes construction of railways, a port and two hydroelectric power stations.

Initially the consortium included CVRD and Eramet, which later opted out as they were reluctant to bear the costs for building the infrastructure, such as the railways.

South African iron ore producer Kumba Resources Ltd and Canadian miner First Quantum announced that they may take legal action to protect their rights to the Kipushi mine project in Congo after state owned mining group Gecamines in the Democratic Republic of Congo launched an appeal last month for new partners to develop the Kipushi zinc and copper mine.

Kumba and First Quantum said in a statement they had rights to the mine and would take legal action to protect them. A Joint statement said "The international mining community is advised that all necessary legal actions will be taken to actively protect, in all circumstances, those rights and those of their affiliates in the Kipushi mine and the Kipushi mining facilities."

Kipushi was one of the world's major zinc and copper producers, but halted production in 1993 due to a lack of foreign exchange and supplies. The mine, located in southeast Congo has total resource of 2.8 million tonnes of zinc and 392,755 tonnes of copper. Congolese Zinc Investments, now owned by First Quantum, first signed a deal with Gecamines in 1996 to rehabilitate the mine and last year renewed a joint venture with Kumba.

Mr Valeriy Piatnytsky deputy economy minister of Ukraine told a media briefing in Kiev that Ukraine may have to significantly cut its metal exports to Romania and Bulgaria in 2007 if the two countries become European Union members before Ukraine joins the World Trade Organization.

Mr Aisen Nikolayev Yakutia's finance minister told a press conference in Moscow that Evraz Group, Mechel, LG and one more foreign company are interested in acquiring shares in Yakutia based coal company Elgaugol.

As per reports, a tender for the Yakutia's 75% minus one share in the Yakutugol coal producer and 39.36% of Elgaugol could be announced by October 15th 2006. Russian Railways RZD, which owns 29.5% of Elgaugol, also plans to re put its interest up for sale together with Yakutia's 39.36% as it has called off earlier separate tender. CJSC Eastern Construction Contract Corporation owns balance 28.8%stake.

Elgaugol holds a license to mine coal within the northwestern section of the Elga coal field. The field should be producing up to 30 million tonnes of coal per year by 2010. Elgauol has performed a pre feasibility study, which puts the cost of building a 30 million tonne operation at $2 billion.

It is reported in Bangladeshi media that in a rally organized by Gano Oikya Front, a newly formed local body against Asia Energys coal mine project, protestors have threatened of tougher agitation if the deal with Asia Energy is not cancelled in accordance with the agreement signed with the National Committee to Protect Oil, Gas and Mineral Resources on August 30th 2006.

Gano Oikya Front leaders criticized the government for not making its position clear as regards the agreement after violent protests by people that cost lives. They said people and political parties are not against extraction of coal and foreign investment in the country but will oppose any deal that will go against national interest.

Mr Aditya Mittal has been appointed as CFO of merged Arcelor-Mittal last month with additional charge of Flat America.

Mr Aditya Mittal held the position of President and CFO of Mittal Steel Company from October 2004. He joined the Group in January 1997 and has held various finance and management roles within the company.

In addition to these responsibilities Mr Aditya Mittal was appointed Head of mergers and acquisitions for the group in 1999. In this role, he led the companys acquisition strategy, resulting in Mittal Steels expansion into Central Europe, Africa and most recently the United States. This led to Mittal Steel emerging as the worlds largest and most global steel producer, growing its steel making capacities fourfold. These acquisitions included Kryvorizhstal in Ukraine, Polskie Huty Stali in Poland, Nova Hut in Czech Republic, Sidex in Romania, Annaba in Algeria, Iscor in South Africa, and International Steel Group in the US.

Mr Aditya Mittal holds a Bachelors Degree of Science in Economics with concentrations in Strategic Management and Corporate Finance from the Wharton School in Pennsylvania from where he graduated magna cum laude.

International Coal Group Inc cut its 2006 outlook due to idling of its Sycamore 2 mine and continued cost pressures at operations in the central and northern Appalachian regions. ICG said that its results to date were hit by $15 million due to the Sago mine accident and the Viper mine fire.

The company now expects a net loss of $10 million to $15 million on revenue or $900 million. ICG had previously forecast net earnings of $23 million to $33 million on revenue of $1 billion.

ICG now expects 2006 coal production of 17 million tons and sales of 20 million tons, down from its earlier production forecast of 18 million tons and sales of 22 million tons.

BNamericas has reported that the Brazilian coal mining company CRM is due to reach capacity of 4.5 million tonnes in the second half of 2009.

Mr David Turik Chazan president told BNamericas that CRM expects to produce 2.1 million ones of coal this year but will increase its capacity to supply coal to the 350MW Candiota III power plant in Rio Grande do Sul state, which is scheduled to start operations in 2010. He said CRM is conducting a bidding process to hire an engineering firm to handle the expansion adding the winner is due to be announced next month.

CRM is controlled by the Rio Grande do Sul state government.

The Herald has reported that Steelmakers Zimbabwe (Pvt) Ltd has submitted a proposal to the Government to revive Ziscosteel.

Mr Alexander Johnson GM of Steelmakers said "We have made plans to revive Ziscosteel and we have sent our proposal to the Government. We are looking to work in partnership with the Government which has said our proposal is very good." Mr Johnson did not reveal the planned investment.

Steelmaker is part of a group of companies with operations in Kenya and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Dover Ohio based Greer Steel has recently upgraded its 30 inch breakdown mill with new gauge and shape control technology. The new equipment will raise the quality standard with better gauge and shape consistency, and accuracy.

The reversing mill, originally designed by Bliss, now features two I2S gamma ray gauges and an automatic gauge control system also designed by I2S. The new AGC system uses a feed forward model, interprets exit gauges and allows greater correction control.

Mr Charles Maul VP sales of Greer Steel said "Our customers can look forward to a number of advantages thanks to this upgrade. For example, there will be even less part to part variance so tool and die life will be extended and higher processing speeds will be possible. Also, because the target gauge can move toward the bottom of the tolerance range, more parts per coil will be possible."

It is reported that Republic Engineered Products Inc is facing possible sanctions and penalties by the US Environmental Protection Agency for alleged clean air violations at the companys steel mill in Lorain. According to a statement by the federal agency it violated federal and state regulations, as well as its state issued operating permit, for exceeding particle emission limits at the Lorain plant in 2005 and 2006.

The agency discovered the alleged violations during inspections and reports submitted by Republic.

Mr John Willoughby Republic spokesman said that as the company received formal notification of the allegations on September 11th charges are under review and company plans to request a conference with the EPA about the allegations.

Mr Wilbur Ross has agreed to buy 2 auto parts makers for $305 million to add sales in Asia and Europe at his global auto components company. Mr Ross's International Automotive Components Group LLC will acquire Mitsuboshi Belting Kaseihin Co. Ltd. of Japan and Germany's BST Safety Textiles GmbH. The Mitsuboshi purchase will be completed by September 30th and the BST acquisition should take place during the fourth quarter.

Closely held BST, based at Maulburg in Germany, makes fabric for air bags, seat belts and commercial webbing.

Kobe based Mitsuboshi Belting Co Ltd owned Mitsuboshi Belting Kaseihin makes instrument panels, cockpits and other plastic products for Japanese automakers.

Mr Ross in an interview said The companies are a very good addition and can contribute to our goals of increasing parts sales in Asia, Europe and South America. Neither of these companies is having difficulty, they're earning money, they're growing.''