Olympics rises on Bellary ore

Olympics rises on Bellary ore

Shivakumar G Malagi | TNN

Bellary: The miners of Bellary are cheering China as it pulls out all stops to make Beijing Olympics a success. For, their ore has gone into building the incredible infrastructure required for the Games.

Many mammoth structures which have come up in Beijing over the past few years were built with steel made from iron ore mined in the Sandur-Hospet-Bellary belt. And, some mining lords plan to visit Beijing during the Games to see it for themselves.

Around the turn of the millennium, many miners were debt-ridden and many lease holders were not ready to pay the small amount for lease renewal as they thought it a ‘waste of money’. That’s also when construction for the Dragon Games took off in right earnest. Overnight, iron ore deposits turned into a goldmine. Bellary iron ore, which was quoted around Rs 150-200 per tonne till the end of 2003, shot up to over Rs 2,000 per tonne with Chinese ore traders eyeing the high quality ore. In 2005 alone, mine owners reportedly made profits of Rs 3,100 crore and illegal miners caused Rs 25,000 crore loss to the exchequer. The iron ore was trucked to Mangalore and Karwar ports and shipped to China.

In 1965, around 4 lakh tonnes ore was exported from this region through National Mineral Develoment Corporation and MMTC channels and the same system was followed till 2000 following the Mines and Minerals (Rules and Development) Act which banned direct ore export by miners. After these restrictions were removed and China’s demand soared, Bellary has exported around 40 million tonnes of ore every year since 2004. China’s steel mills and Hong Kong ore traders were big buyers and they stocked ore in huge amounts in ports and sold it to mills which supplied steel for construction of the Games Village and venues for sporting events.

Now, following speculation of a slump in ore prices after the Olympics, miners have reportedly stocked ore and accelerated excavation to cash in on the boom.

P S Prasad, deputy director, department of mines and geology, Hospet, said, “Any boom has to end some day. Currently, there’s no discernible decrease in exports. Last year, we exported 40 million tonnes and over the past three months alone, we exported 5 million tonnes. Of late, exports to Romania and Japan are picking up and other countries too are importing Bellary ore in small amounts,” he said.

Former president of All India Mine Owners and Suppliers Association Hothur Abdul Wahab said, “Rumours of the drastic decrease in ore exports will certainly not affect legal mine owners. Domestic ore consumption is witnessing a big surge with many steel plants coming up across the country.”