07-07-2012, 10:26 AM
Illegal Mining in GOA
Illegal Mining in GOA.ppt (Size: 1.75 MB / Downloads: 64)
Importance of iron ore
Elemental Iron (Fe) is ranked fourth in abundance in the earth's crust and is the major constituent of the Earth's core.
Iron accounts for approximately 95% of all metals used by modern industrial society.
Metallic iron is most commonly produced from the smelting of iron ore to produce pig iron.
Steel is a processed form of pig iron.
Iron and steel produced from iron ore are essential for developing infrastructure.
Contributes to India exports, which in turn helps in improving CAD( current account deficit).
Iron and steel are also used in manufacturing utensils , electric equipments and other household articles.
Goa Iron ore
Goa’s infrastructure better than other exporting regions of the country
Network of rivers that connect the mines with the natural port provide a cost effective and efficient mechanism to export.
The major players in the Goan iron industry are Sesa Goa, Chowgules, Salgaocars, Dempos, Fomento and the Timblos.
China’s Influence
India is the third largest exporter of iron ore to China
Iron ore constitutes 53% of total Indian exports to China and 16% of Chinese iron ore demand
China requires over 700mt of iron ore to achieve steel production target of 600mt.
No takers for Goa’s low grade iron ore in Indian steel industry.
From 2005 China started buying this low grade ore as it had the technology to blend it with high grade ore from Australia and use it for producing iron and steel. This led to excessive and illegal mining
Mining Problem
Mining used to take place in Goa since 6 decades. Japan and South Korea used the high grade ore
For 1 mt of high grade iron ore 3 mt of ore had to be rejected, this was the low grade ore. This used to be dumped.
Law provision
This statement appears to violate the intent of India’s Foreign Contribution Regulation Act of 1976 which states clearly (Chapter 11 page 3) that: “No foreign contribution shall be accepted by any candidate for election”, and which was amended – and tightened – on May 1 this year, so as to place “any payment of a political nature” in the category “prohibited to accept foreign contributions”.
Recommendations to curb illegal mining in goa
Corruption in the mining sector has largely been due to extraction of ore in volumes that are greater than the permissible volumes. We need to build an information system which will monitor the movement of ore from the mines to the ports or across our border.
We need to have a central repository of data that would include following data:-i. List of mines (Operational & Non-Operational mines).
ii.Minor & Major mineral lease holders.
Installation of RFID tag on all trucks with a unique serial number for e.g. a combination of lease and truck registration number.
RFID- Radio Frequency Identification .