India's Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) will resume supplies of low grade iron ore fines from its dumps and tailing ponds to India-based pellet manufacturer KIOCL Limited for conversion to pellets, an official at India's Ministry of Steel said on Thursday, May 9.
Supplies of fines to KIOCL stopped when the Ministry of Mines issued a directive in September 2012 preventing iron ore from captive mines allocated to steel mills to being sold or exported, the official said.
Under the conversion arrangement concluded early last year, KIOCL supplied 400,000 mt of pellets before the conversion arrangement was suspended following the directive from the Ministry of Mines.
With SAIL resuming raw material supplies to KIOCL for value addition, it is expected that the latter will receive 1.1 million mt of fines from SAIL dumps and tailing ponds for each metric ton of pellets supplied by KIOCL.
The SAIL-KIOCL conversion arrangements will be effective until SAIL's own beneficiation and pelletization projects currently underway are completed, the official added.