Mon Aug 15, 2011
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India's iron ore exports, which fell for the first time in a decade last year, could halve over the next five years as the country feeds the expansion of its steel industry.
Here are some key facts about the Indian iron ore industry:
PRODUCTION:
- India produced 212.6 million tonnes of iron ore in 2010/11 and exported 97.6 million tonnes.
- There are about 500 mines in the country, half of which are operational. These are held by about 80 companies.
- High-grade ores with 62-65 percent iron are produced mainly in the east and south. Low-grade ores with 50-60 percent iron are produced in the west and south.
- The largest mining firm is state-run NMDC, which produces about 29 million tonnes annually, mostly for local sales.
- The steel industry is a big domestic user of iron ore. Many steel companies have captive mines.
EXPORTS:
- India is the world's third-largest exporter after Australia and Brazil. Goa is India's biggest exporter.
- China is India's biggest buyer, with its proximity helping it secure ores with low freight costs. India sells the bulk of its iron ore via the spot market.
- The largest exporting company is Sesa Goa, a unit of London-listed Vedanta Resources.
- Other large producers and exporters are Essel Mining, Rungta Mines, V.M. Salgaocar, MSPL and Chowgule.
- Miners in Goa have lower costs as mines are located near the port, and so avoid road and rail charges.
CHALLENGES:
- In its 2011/12 budget, the federal government hiked export duties on iron ore to 20 percent from 5 percent for fines and from 15 percent for lumps in a bid to cool domestic prices to help steel firms.
- Shipments from Karnataka, source of a quarter of India's annual exports, have been banned since July 2010 and exports have yet to resume despite a Supreme Court order allowing shipments from April 20.
- Port infrastructure is poor and vessels can wait up to seven days to load cargo.
- Indian prices generally follow the global market, dominated by Australian and Brazilian miners, with China buying on a spot basis for its low-grade ore needs.
- Slower exports could mean a surge in stocks of fines, complicating storage problems at mines. The Karnataka ban led to an estimated 15 million tonnes of unsold stocks of low-grade ore lying in the mines as of late July this year.
FUTURES
- The world's first iron ore futures debuted in India on Jan. 29, but volumes have been muted as participation of foreign players is not allowed.
Sources: Federation of Indian Mineral Industries, industry members and Ministry of Mines.
Showing posts with label Facebook. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Facebook. Show all posts
Monday, August 15, 2011
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
China Tightens Censorship of Electronic Communications
Mar21, 2011BEIJING — If anyone wonders whether the Chinese government has tightened its grip on electronic communications since protests began engulfing the Arab world, Shakespeare may prove instructive.
A Beijing entrepreneur, discussing restaurant choices with his fiancée over their cellphones last week, quoted Queen Gertrude’s response to Hamlet: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.” The second time he said the word “protest,” her phone cut off.
He spoke English, but another caller, repeating the same phrase on Monday in Chinese over a different phone, was also cut off in midsentence.
A host of evidence over the past several weeks shows that Chinese authorities are more determined than ever to police cellphone calls, electronic messages, e-mail and access to the Internet in order to smother any hint of antigovernment sentiment. In the cat-and-mouse game that characterizes electronic communications here, analysts suggest that the cat is getting bigger, especially since revolts began to ricochet through the Middle East and North Africa, and homegrown efforts to organize protests in China began to circulate on the Internet about a month ago.
“The hard-liners have won the field, and now we are seeing exactly how they want to run the place,” said Russell Leigh Moses, a Beijing analyst of China’s leadership. “I think the gloves are coming off.”
On Sunday, Google accused the Chinese government of disrupting its Gmail service in the country and making it appear as if technical problems at Google — not government intervention — were to blame.
Several popular virtual private-network services, or V.P.N.’s, designed to evade the government’s computerized censors, have been crippled. This has prompted an outcry from users as young as ninth graders with school research projects and sent them on a frustrating search for replacements that can pierce the so-called Great Firewall, a menu of direct censorship and “opinion guidance” that restricts what Internet users can read or write online. V.P.N.’s are popular with China’s huge expatriate community and Chinese entrepreneurs, researchers and scholars who expect to use the Internet freely.
In an apology to customers in China for interrupted service, WiTopia, a V.P.N. provider, cited “increased blocking attempts.” No perpetrator was identified.
Beyond these problems, anecdotal evidence suggests that the government’s computers, which intercept incoming data and compare it with an ever-changing list of banned keywords or Web sites, are shutting out more information. The motive is often obvious: For six months or more, the censors have prevented Google searches of the English word “freedom.”
But other terms or Web sites are suddenly or sporadically blocked for reasons no ordinary user can fathom. One Beijing technology consultant, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution against his company, said that for several days last week he could not visit the Web site for the Hong Kong Stock Exchange without a proxy. LinkedIn, a networking platform, was blocked for a day during the height of government concerns over Internet-based calls for protests in Chinese cities a few weeks ago, he said.
Hu Yong, a media professor at Peking University, said government censors were constantly spotting and reacting to new perceived threats. “The technology is improving and the range of sensitive terms is expanding because the depth and breadth of things they must manage just keeps on growing,” Mr. Hu said.
China’s censorship machine has been operating ever more efficiently since mid-2008, and restrictions once viewed as temporary — like bans on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter — are now considered permanent. Government-friendly alternatives have sprung and developed a following.
Few analysts believe that the government will loosen controls any time soon, with events it considers politically sensitive swamping the calendar, including a turnover in the Communist Party’s top leadership next year.
“It has been double the guard, and double the guard, and you never hear proclamations about things being relaxed,” said Duncan Clark, chairman of BDA China, an investment and strategy consultancy based in Beijing, and a 17-year resident of China. “We have never seen this level of control in the time I have been here, and I have been here since the beginning of the Internet.”
How far China will clamp down on electronic communications is unclear. “There’s a lot more they can do, but they’ve been holding back,” said Bill Bishop, a Internet expert based in Beijing. Some analysts suggest that officials are exploring just how much inconvenience the Chinese are willing to tolerate. While sentiment is hard to gauge, a certain segment of society rejects censorship.
For many users, an inoperable V.P.N. is an inconvenience, not a crisis. But Internet consultants said interfering with an e-mail service on which people depend every day is more serious. “How people respond is going to be more intense, more visceral,” one consultant said.
Google began receiving complaints from Gmail users and its own employees in China about a month ago, around the time anonymous Internet posts urged people unhappy with the government to gather every Sunday. Some Gmail users found their service disconnected when they tried to send or save messages.
Engineers determined that there were no technical difficulties on Google’s end, Google said; rather, the hand of the Chinese government was at work. China’s Foreign Ministry did not respond Monday to calls or faxed questions about Google’s statement.
Disrupting Web sites and Internet connections is a standard tactic in dealing with companies that fall out of government favor. Mark Seiden, an Internet consultant, said Chinese officials typically left the companies and users to guess the reason.
In the Google case, an article on the Web site of People’s Daily, the Communist Party’s official publication, offered a strong hint. The March 4 article, attributed to a netizen, called Google a tool of the United States government. Like Facebook and Twitter, the article said, Google has “played a role in manufacturing social disorder” and sought to involve itself in other nations’ politics.
China has treated Google as a threat for some time. Last year, Google closed its search service and redirected Chinese users to Google’s Hong Kong site after the company said China was behind a cyberattack aimed partly at Gmail accounts.
Mr. Moses, the Beijing analyst, said the latest moves further expand government control of electronic communications. “The model for this government is that every day is a new challenge and a new opportunity to show the strength of the state here,” he said. “There is clear confidence in the capability of the political authorities to maintain order.” (sourced:NYTIMES)
A Beijing entrepreneur, discussing restaurant choices with his fiancée over their cellphones last week, quoted Queen Gertrude’s response to Hamlet: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.” The second time he said the word “protest,” her phone cut off.
He spoke English, but another caller, repeating the same phrase on Monday in Chinese over a different phone, was also cut off in midsentence.
A host of evidence over the past several weeks shows that Chinese authorities are more determined than ever to police cellphone calls, electronic messages, e-mail and access to the Internet in order to smother any hint of antigovernment sentiment. In the cat-and-mouse game that characterizes electronic communications here, analysts suggest that the cat is getting bigger, especially since revolts began to ricochet through the Middle East and North Africa, and homegrown efforts to organize protests in China began to circulate on the Internet about a month ago.
“The hard-liners have won the field, and now we are seeing exactly how they want to run the place,” said Russell Leigh Moses, a Beijing analyst of China’s leadership. “I think the gloves are coming off.”
On Sunday, Google accused the Chinese government of disrupting its Gmail service in the country and making it appear as if technical problems at Google — not government intervention — were to blame.
Several popular virtual private-network services, or V.P.N.’s, designed to evade the government’s computerized censors, have been crippled. This has prompted an outcry from users as young as ninth graders with school research projects and sent them on a frustrating search for replacements that can pierce the so-called Great Firewall, a menu of direct censorship and “opinion guidance” that restricts what Internet users can read or write online. V.P.N.’s are popular with China’s huge expatriate community and Chinese entrepreneurs, researchers and scholars who expect to use the Internet freely.
In an apology to customers in China for interrupted service, WiTopia, a V.P.N. provider, cited “increased blocking attempts.” No perpetrator was identified.
Beyond these problems, anecdotal evidence suggests that the government’s computers, which intercept incoming data and compare it with an ever-changing list of banned keywords or Web sites, are shutting out more information. The motive is often obvious: For six months or more, the censors have prevented Google searches of the English word “freedom.”
But other terms or Web sites are suddenly or sporadically blocked for reasons no ordinary user can fathom. One Beijing technology consultant, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution against his company, said that for several days last week he could not visit the Web site for the Hong Kong Stock Exchange without a proxy. LinkedIn, a networking platform, was blocked for a day during the height of government concerns over Internet-based calls for protests in Chinese cities a few weeks ago, he said.
Hu Yong, a media professor at Peking University, said government censors were constantly spotting and reacting to new perceived threats. “The technology is improving and the range of sensitive terms is expanding because the depth and breadth of things they must manage just keeps on growing,” Mr. Hu said.
China’s censorship machine has been operating ever more efficiently since mid-2008, and restrictions once viewed as temporary — like bans on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter — are now considered permanent. Government-friendly alternatives have sprung and developed a following.
Few analysts believe that the government will loosen controls any time soon, with events it considers politically sensitive swamping the calendar, including a turnover in the Communist Party’s top leadership next year.
“It has been double the guard, and double the guard, and you never hear proclamations about things being relaxed,” said Duncan Clark, chairman of BDA China, an investment and strategy consultancy based in Beijing, and a 17-year resident of China. “We have never seen this level of control in the time I have been here, and I have been here since the beginning of the Internet.”
How far China will clamp down on electronic communications is unclear. “There’s a lot more they can do, but they’ve been holding back,” said Bill Bishop, a Internet expert based in Beijing. Some analysts suggest that officials are exploring just how much inconvenience the Chinese are willing to tolerate. While sentiment is hard to gauge, a certain segment of society rejects censorship.
For many users, an inoperable V.P.N. is an inconvenience, not a crisis. But Internet consultants said interfering with an e-mail service on which people depend every day is more serious. “How people respond is going to be more intense, more visceral,” one consultant said.
Google began receiving complaints from Gmail users and its own employees in China about a month ago, around the time anonymous Internet posts urged people unhappy with the government to gather every Sunday. Some Gmail users found their service disconnected when they tried to send or save messages.
Engineers determined that there were no technical difficulties on Google’s end, Google said; rather, the hand of the Chinese government was at work. China’s Foreign Ministry did not respond Monday to calls or faxed questions about Google’s statement.
Disrupting Web sites and Internet connections is a standard tactic in dealing with companies that fall out of government favor. Mark Seiden, an Internet consultant, said Chinese officials typically left the companies and users to guess the reason.
In the Google case, an article on the Web site of People’s Daily, the Communist Party’s official publication, offered a strong hint. The March 4 article, attributed to a netizen, called Google a tool of the United States government. Like Facebook and Twitter, the article said, Google has “played a role in manufacturing social disorder” and sought to involve itself in other nations’ politics.
China has treated Google as a threat for some time. Last year, Google closed its search service and redirected Chinese users to Google’s Hong Kong site after the company said China was behind a cyberattack aimed partly at Gmail accounts.
Mr. Moses, the Beijing analyst, said the latest moves further expand government control of electronic communications. “The model for this government is that every day is a new challenge and a new opportunity to show the strength of the state here,” he said. “There is clear confidence in the capability of the political authorities to maintain order.” (sourced:NYTIMES)
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