Union Minister of Steel and Petroleum and Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan today held a meeting with Chief Minister of Odisha Shri Naveen Patnaik and Union Minister of Mines, Coal and Parliament Affairs Shri Pralhad Joshi.
Discussions centred around resolving the issues regarding operationalisation of the auctioned iron ore mines in Odisha where production and dispatch has still not commenced. The lease of these mines had lapsed on 31st March, 2020, pursuant to which fresh auction was carried out.
Shri Pradhan emphasised on the need of an early resolution in this regard by the Ministry of Mines so that seamless availability of raw material to the end-user is ensured. This would result in reducing the price of iron ore which has gone up substantially in the last one month due to adverse market sentiments, emanating primarily from reduced supply of iron ore in Odisha from the recently auctioned mines.
As against production of 123.8 mn t iron ore in Odisha from Jan 2019 to Nov 2019, total production in the same period in current year has been only 98.2 mn t. Out of the recently auctioned 19 iron ore mines in Odisha, only 8 have been able to start production and dispatch till date. This is the main reason for shortfall in iron ore supply in the country.
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