India approves MMTC's long-term agreements

India's Federal Cabinet approved government-owned trading house MMTC Ltd. to enter fresh long-term agreements to export iron ore to Japanese, South Korean and Chinese steel mills. The agreements will be for five years and will take effect March 31. The Cabinet also approved a proposal by the Ministry of Coal and Mines to reduce the annual ceiling on iron ore exports from the government-owned Bailadila mines. Accordingly, the annual ceiling has been reduced to 2.7 million metric tons, down 10 percent from 3 million metric tons currently, for lump iron ore. For fine iron ore, the export ceiling has been lowered to 1.81 million metric tons from 3.8 million metric tons.