SAIL to invest in capacity expansion

Indian Steel Minister Ram Vilas Paswan announced late last week that the country's largest, state-owned steelmaker, Steel Authority of India Ltd. (SAIL), will invest Rupees 1 trillion ($22.6 billion) in expanding its capacity to 40 million metric tons by 2020. SAIL previously announced that it would raise its capacity to 23.8 million metric tons at the cost of about Rupees 400 billion ($9 billion) by 2010, up from the current level of 14.6 million metric tons. This current massive investment comes at a time when the country's other large steel producers, such as Tata Steel, Essar and Jindal, have announced expansion of their capacities.