In May this year, Brazilian miner Vale's iron ore export volume totaled 29.78 million mt, up 4.7 percent compared to May 2017 and increasing by 19.5 percent compared to April, according to Brazil's National Union of the Industry of Extraction of Iron and Base Metals (Sinferbase). In the January-May period of the current year, Vale's iron ore exports decreased by 0.1 percent year on year to 127.91 million metric tons.
Meanwhile, in May this year Vale's iron ore sales in its domestic market amounted to 1.43 million mt, increasing by 50.8 percent year on year and up by 2.1 percent month on month. In the first five months of this year, Vale's iron ore sales in its domestic market totaled 7.1 million mt, rising by 31.5 percent as compared with the same period last year.