india to ban all iron ore exports, page-3

This has been mooted in India for sometime, but the reality is, it may only happen once Indian Steel Mills can not get enough IO to meet their requirements. India is not China in political terms and the beaurocracy is unbelievable. It takes years to change anything.

Not sure if you saw the interview with TTY Chairman on Business news this week, but he stated Chinese domestic IO production is now the highest cost in the world (they apparantly start from very low grades and upgrade) and over the next decade this will need to be replaced. Not sure exactly how much they produce but I seem to recall about 400/500 million tonnes per year. I think this is why, BHP/RIo and FMG are continually increasing production to replace declining Chinese domestic supply. This will obviously be a gradual process, however I do remember reading a report late last year, than when IO prices dropped very strongly in mid 2009, it was the domestic producers in China that were forced to cut production and this eventually corrected the market. This makes more sense to me than Indians banning exports. Just my view and I am obviously not privy to what happens in Indian parliment.