The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India expects the Indias domestic steel industry to grow by nearly 10% to 12% by 2012 thus surpassing the 6.9% growth target set in the national steel policy resulting in capacity of 73 million tonnes per annum as against the NSP projections of 57 million tonne.

Anil Agarwal president of ASSOCHAM said "With the increased rate of growth witnessed in both economy and steel in the last three years, the NSP target of 6.9% or 57 million tonne by 2012 will be easily overshot by at least 10 million tonnes at a growth rate of about 10%.

The newly inducted government in Jharkhand announced that it will allow Mittal Steel to put up its proposed 12 million tonne steel project in the state only if the company agreed to work in the interest of the state. Mr Madhu Koda new CM of Jharkhand told media If they agree to work in the interest of the state and also agree to our conditions, we would take a decision on them then.

Mr Koda assured that his government would speed up iron ore mine allocation process. He said We would take up the lease distribution matter shortly as we want industry to be set up in Jharkhand. However, we would see that the interest of the state is served first.

Incidentally Mr Koda was Jharkhands mines and geology minister in the previous government but he absolved himself from the blame that the last government had done little by saying Thats why I left the government as no developmental work was taking place. I, on my part, had discharged my duty with sincerity.

Jindal Steel and Power Limited plans to hold talks next week with the Bolivian government to finalize the contract for the development of El Mutun mines. Mr Vikrant Gujral VC & CEO told ET that We will be in Bolivia next week to hold talks on various parameters of the project including the setting up of plants and mining. The final agreement will be signed later.

Mr Gujral refuted reports that the project may face delays as JSPL has been asked by the government to create a local subsidiary. He said This is untrue. We received the qualification letter from the Bolivian government last week. The letter is supposed to be a virtual go ahead for the project. The subsidiary issue is part of any project and will be included in the talks.

Maruti Clean Coal and Power Ltd will invest Rs.10.70 billion ($233 million) to set up a 270MW thermal power plant in Korba district of Chhattisgarh.

Mr Rajesh Munat industry minister of Chattisgarh said "Maruti Clean Coal and Power signed a MoU with the Chhattisgarh government late Tuesday under which the private company will invest Rs.10.70 billion for a 270 MW thermal power plant to be set up in Korba district.

Mr Munat said "The Company will soon table the feasibility report to the state government for a formal approval for the plant build up process. It will also provide jobs to local people in the plant in accordance with our industrial policy.

Under the MoU terms, MCCPL will provide 5% of its total power generation to the state government on variable cost while the government will have a right to purchase power from the plant up to 30% of the total production.

It is reported that Kalinga Nagar remained tense for the third consecutive day today following an agitation by the contract laborers in the supply wing of the Neelanchal Ispat Nigam Limited.

About 1,500 contract labors under the banner of Kalinga Nagar Majdoor Union have been agitating for past 3 days for fulfilling their lone demand that they should be given Durga Puja bonus of Rs 8000 at par with regular employees instead of Rs 800.

NINL management hopes to reach an accord soon.

It is reported that India railway ministry is in the process of registering the company for the dedicated freight corridor called Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Ltd and hopes to complete the registration process by October end.

RITES is expected to complete the location survey by December enabling the new corporation to start inviting tenders for the ground work, signaling and electrification of tracks etc.

TATA Power Company Ltd and Damodar Valley Corporations 74:26 JV Maithon Power Ltd has announced its ground breaking for the 1000 MW mega Right Bank Thermal Power Project at Maithon on September 27th 2006.

Mr Sushilkumar Shinde union minister for power said "I am happy that the much awaited 1000 MW Maithon Right Bank Power Project is being commenced through a pioneering Joint Venture initiative of Tata Power and DVC I am delighted to be present for the auspicious occasion of Ground breaking ceremony of this historic project."

As per current plans, the project will comprise of two generating units of which the commissioning of the first unit is scheduled for Late 2009 and that of the second unit by mid 2010. The estimated capital cost of the project is around Rs 3800 crores and will be funded through a 70:30 debt to equity ratio. TATA Power will contribute Rs 840 crores to the equity corpus with DVC contributing about Rs 300 crores. Financial closure for the Maithon Project is targeted around mid 2007.

Power from the Maithon Project is to be exported to power deficit western and northern states and for meeting the requirements of DVC.

The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India has organized a conference on Indian steel industry called India Steel Summit: Galvanizing Future Growth today at Le-Meridien in New Delhi.

Mr Ram Vilas Paswan union minister of steel, chemical & fertilizers is scheduled to address the inaugural session. Mr RS Pandey secretary steel, Mr SK Roongta chairman of SAIL, Mr Y Siva Sagara Rao CMD of Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd are also scheduled to address the occasion. The Summit shall come to end with valedictory address by Dr Akhilesh Das the minister of state for steel.

As per a company release, the board of directors of Sical Logistics has approved a proposal to acquire 100% shares of Bergen Offshore Logistics, a company incorporated in Singapore.

Gujarat NRE Coke Ltd has announced that its associate company Gujarat NRE Mineral Resources Ltd has signed a binding agreement with Rey Resources Ltd to farm into the tenements 10/04-5 and 11/04-5. The Agreement is subject to various government and regulatory approvals being obtained latest by June 30, 2007.

The Agreement provides for GNMRL to assume ownership and operator ship of the permits through its Australian subsidiary NRE Resources Pty Ltd. The interest of the parties will be 90% NRE and 10% Rey which 10% will be free carried until the Grant of a petroleum production license.

Rey Resources Ltd (Rey) is an Australian listed company, established in 2004 to develop a portfolio of coal, copper and gold exploration projects in Australia, Chile and Peru. Rey holds 18 exploration licenses in Canning Basin, Western Australia covering an area of 3970 square kilometers. Rey is the preferred applicant for oil tenements 10/04-5 and 11/04-5 located in the central part of the Canning Basin, Western Australia. During October 2005 the NRE acquired a 19.9% holding in the paid up equity of Rey and Mr Arun Kumar Jagatramka joined the board of Rey as a director.

World's largest steel company Arcelor Mittal has unveiled a new dividend policy in which it will pay an annual base dividend of $1.3, supplemented by a share buy back program, allowing it to return 30% of net income to shareholders every year. The policy already approved by its board of directors will be proposed to the shareholders vote at the next general meeting. This new distribution policy will be implemented as 1st January 2007, for the 2006 results.

The Board of Directors proposes an annual base dividend of $1.3 designed to guarantee a minimum payout per year and would rise in order to reflect the underlying growth of the company. Payment of this dividend will be on a quarterly basis.

In addition to this dividend, the Board of Directors is proposing a share buy back program, tailored to match the 30% distribution pay out commitment of the group.

As a consequence, the sum of the annual base dividend and the share buy back program will each year represent 30% of the annual net income. The proposed size of the share buy back will be announced at the time of the annual results.

Mr Aditya Mittal CFO of Arcelor Mittal said "The commitment we have made to pay a base dividend of $1.3 per share is a reflection of the economic strength of Arcelor Mittal. The overriding reason for the two companies merging was to deliver the financial stability and consistency that investors' desire. This dividend and share buy-back commitment is a measure of our confidence in the potential of Arcelor Mittal."

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd and Nippon Steel Corporation have jointly developed a technology to use higher tensile strength steel with yield stress of 47 kgf/mm2 for the longitudinal strength member of super sized containerships. The container ship will be built at MHI's Nagasaki Shipyard and Machinery Works while the HTSS steel plate will be produced at Nippon Steel's Oita Works.

New container ships are increasing in size in a move toward transport efficiency. Accordingly, the steel plates used for larger ships are also becoming thicker. However, when plates become thicker, toughness tends to decline. Nippon Steel has developed the new HTSS by applying its Thermo Mechanical Control Process technology, a production process that concurrently enhances strength, toughness and weldability of steel through hot rolling and online water cooling.

Use of the new HTSS, which has successfully achieved toughness in addition to increased strength and reduced thickness, will not only contribute to improvements in weight reduction and fuel efficiency, but also increase the reliability of the ship's hull. The longitudinal strength member is the most important part of a container ship's hull. In addition to improved hull safety with higher toughness steel, the reduced volume of steel and resultant lighter ship weight will allow greater deadweight.

Uzbek government has announced a tender for sale of 35.55% stake in coal producer Uzbekugol JSC. The Bid submission deadline expires at 12 AM Tashkent time on 28 November 2006.

The tender announcement said that the government will sell 1,045,853 ordinary shares, which constitutes 35.55% shares of the company's total issued shares. Starting bidding price for 35.55% stake in Uzbekugol ser at $30.579 million and the preference will be given to the company ready to offer the highest bid for the 35.55% of shares of the company and undertake the highest volume of investment obligations, based on the volume of enterprise's investment requirements. The announcement said that the investment needs of the company constitute the amount of $232 million.

Uzbekcoal JSC is a part of state joint stock company Uzbekenergo.

Southern Steel Berhad announced that it has entered into 3 conditional sale and purchase agreements with NatSteel Asia Pvt Ltd for divesting its stake in 3 companies

1. For disposal of entire equity interest of 40% in NatSteel Trade International Pte Ltd for a cash consideration of SG$6.538 million

2. For disposal of entire equity interest of 50% in Southern NatSteel (Xiamen) Limited for a cash consideration of SG$19.357 million.

3. For disposal of entire equity interest of 22.6% in NatSteelVina Company Ltd for a cash consideration of SG$3.105 million.

Mr Ronald Junk CEO of Arcelor Mittal during a presentation in London assured the investors that the acrimony of the lengthy takeover battle had evaporated. He said "We are creating and designing a new company. There's no Arcelor way or Mittal way. We just follow best practice and if there's none inside the company, we go and get it outside. We are working as a team and we must move fast while our competitors still believe we will have a lot of trouble."

Mr Junck said that an integration team was in place and strongly emphasized the importance of working together and keeping the company as lean as possible. He said "We have to remain a very agile company. We cannot on one side take advantage of our size and on the other hand destroy that advantage by becoming slow and bureaucratic."

Wartsila, China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries are establishing a 27:50:23 JV to manufacture large, low speed marine engines in China. The start-up of the joint venture is subject to final approvals, which are expected to be received by the end of October 2006.

The JV will be called Qingdao Qiyao Wartsila MHI Linshan Marine Diesel Co Ltd. The investment will total around 75 million euros, spread over several years. Production is scheduled to start during the fourth quarter of 2008.

ITAR-TASS reported that a government commission in Kazakhstan has ruled that a recent explosion and fire at a coal mine belonging to a unit of Mittal Steel was the result of a major breach of safety regulations.

Mr Shalbai Kulmakhanov Kazakhstans emergency situations minister and investigation commission's chairman during a meeting with Mr Danial Akhmetov PM of Kazakhstan said "The tragedy was down to human error, in particular a failure to follow safety rules,"

According to Kulmakhanov, 8 sub commissions made up of police, prosecutors and National Security Committee officials are currently looking into the disaster, which killed 41 miners at the Lenin mine on September 20th and will complete the work by the end of this week and present conclusions.

Reuter has reported that Luxembourg has made Mr Alexei Mordashov its honorary consul in Russia.

Luxembourg said the honorary title was granted to Mordashov because of his long standing links with the Grand Duchy's business community and not because of his attempts to frustrate Mittal Steel's ultimately successful bid for Arcelor.

Mr Mordashov, who owns about 90% of Severstal offered to merge his company with Arcelor but lost the bidding war when Mittal Steel increased its offer to 31 billion euros ($39.34 billion).

Novamerican Steel Inc announced the installation of a new pipe finishing facility at its Nova Tube and Steel operation at Morrisville in Pennsylvania, which will add 50,000 tons of finished pipes on Nova's existing 7" structural tube mill. The project is estimated to cost US $8.5 million and is scheduled for completion in late 2007.

Mr Scott Jones president of Novamerican Steel said "Our customers have been so pleased with the quality of our structural round tubing that it was a natural evolution for us to proceed with this investment into the pipe market. We will be investing in state of the art, in line equipment to ensure that we are the "lowest cost, highest quality" producer in our market".

Novamerican Steel Inc, based at Montreal in Canada with eleven operating locations in Canada and eleven operating locations in the US, processes and distributes carbon steel, stainless steel and aluminum products, including carbon steel tubing for structural and automotive markets.

Kazakhstan Today has reported that the top management of Mittal Steel Temirtau has promised to raise the salaries of Karaganda miners. The report cites Mr Grigoriy ED of the coal department of Mittal Steel Temirtau as saying that "The Company guarantees obligatory pay raises, but the sizes will be defined in the nearest 10 days."

A commission on settlement of the dispute between the company and the miners started its work in Shakhtinsk. Mr Nurlan Nigmatullin regional governor, Mr Nurlan Tulepov mayor of the town, Mr Shaimerden Urazalinov MP, Mr Vladimir Nehoroshev MP, the top management of Mittal Steel Temirtau as well as delegates from all eight mines of Karaganda region participated in the commission work. The commission will work for four weeks.

All issues will be being divided into sets, in particular, such as the salary raises for the miners, the improvement of labor conditions, and updating of equipment. Besides, it is planned to revise the social status of Shakhtinsk.

Mr Carlo Panunzi has been appointed in Arcelor Mittals management committee board this month as CEO Long Americas

Mr Carlo Panunzi previously was senior executive VP of Arcelor Brasil, in charge of long products and distribution.

In 2002, Mr Carlo Panunzi became the president of Belgo Mineira a company he had joined in 1999 and where he was, among other positions, MD of the Piracicaba plant in the State of S Paulo. Before that, he held several positions at ARBED, which he joined in 1973 as an engineer at the Differdange plants rolling line.

According to a statement by the South Koreas ministry of commerce, industry & energy, state owned Korea Resources Corp is considering to jointly developing a soft coal mine in Bangladesh with Petrobangla.

The statement said "The South Korean government will help Korea Resources sign the MOU with the Bangladeshi company to develop Dighipara mine, which has an estimated reserve of 600 million tons of soft coal.

It added that the government will also help Korean companies looking to participate in a project to build a 500MW to 1,000MW thermal power plant near Dighipara field, if Korea Resources secures the Dighipara joint venture.

Mr Graham Kraehe chairman of BlueScope Steel Limited announced the appointment of development and construction industry leader Mr Daniel Grollo as a non executive director effective from 27 September 2006. He will join Mr Kraehe, Mr Ron McNeilly, Mr Kirby Adams, Ms Diane Grady, Mr Kevin McCann, Mr Paul Rizzo and Mr Tan Yam Pin as the eighth member of the BlueScope Steel Board.

Mr Grollo is CEO of Australia's largest privately owned development and construction company, Grocon Pty Ltd. He is also currently President of the Victorian Division of the Property Council of Australia and a Director of the Green Building Council of Australia. Mr Grollo was a business representative at the Australia Future Directions Forum attended by 100 future leaders in Melbourne last year.

Mr Kraehe said "In light of the growth in the Company's business since its public listing in 2002, including acquisition and development of the Butler pre engineered buildings business and development of Lysaght building solutions in Australia and Asia, the Board has been looking to complement its existing skills by including additional experience from the building and construction sector. Mr Grollo is a candidate from outside the traditional pool of talent from which Australian listed public companies draw their directors. He will bring a fresh perspective and a new generation of business experience that complements the existing Board of prominent directors drawn from leaders in their fields. BlueScope Steel is delighted to have a young businessman with Mr Grollo's background and industry involvement joins the Board. His experience will contribute to our strategy of growing BlueScope Steel's downstream involvement with building and construction. His extensive knowledge of this industry will make a valuable contribution to BlueScope Steel's future growth."

Mr Grollo said he was very pleased to be joining BlueScope Steel's Board. "I hope my role in the building and construction industry will enable me to make a positive contribution to BlueScope Steel's growth strategy. I am also keen to work with the other directors to gain first-hand experience of the governance processes of a major Australian public company."

Mr Liu Zhenjiang deputy director of China's Iron & Steel Association during a meeting at Baotou in Inner Mongolia said that there are eight 10 million ton steel plants, seventeen 5 million ton plants and more than thirty 3 million ton plants in China.

Mexican steelmaker Grupo Simec announced plans to submit to shareholders a proposed $250 million capital increase. Simec said that the increase, if carried out, would broaden its shareholder base while diluting the controlling shareholder by 20%.

Simec is the main unit of Industrias CH and accounts for most of ICH's Mexican operations as well as 50.2% of US concern PAV Republic that ICH and Simec bought last year.

Guadalajara based Simec reported sales of MXN11.82 billion ($1.07 billion) in the first half of this year and sold about 1.4 million tons of steel products during the period.

POSCO announced that it is reviewing with other companies the opportunities for metallurgic development in the northern Chinese province of Heilongjiang with other companies.

Posco, while responding to a Korean Stock Exchange request for disclosure regarding its plan for developing metallurgic coal, said it has had preliminary discussions over the matter, but nothing has been determined.

Posco's filing with the Securities and Exchange Wednesday didn't provide further details of its plans for expansion into the province.