The big mining houses have the capacity to meet the world’s rising demand for fuels and ores in the coming decades, said BHP Billiton’s chief executive, as he played down fears ex-pressed by industrialising nations over “resources security”.

But Marius Kloppers also underlined the scale of demand expected from
fast-developing nations when he said that China alone may require five
times as much iron ore in the next 15 years as it had in the past 15.

By 2030, China would have more than 220 cities with populations above 1m people, said Mr Kloppers.

BHP, the world’s biggest mining group, and Rio Tinto, its
Anglo-Australian rival, are working to a December 5 deadline to agree
an iron ore joint venture production company that would pool the
groups’ operations in Western Australia’s Pilbara region.

The venture, which would dominate the global iron ore industry, is
opposed by steelmakers in China, Japan and Europe, which say that it
would restrict competition.

The European Commission is expected to be the most significant regulatory obstacle to the joint venture.

Mr Kloppers said that, between now and 2025, China may require 18bn-
25bn tonnes of iron ore to make steel compared with about 5bn tonnes in
the past 15 years.

“Companies like BHP, and many of our competitors, have deep commitments
to delivering re-sources for which we are contracted,” he said.

Japan’s economic rise provided a lesson to other countries because it,
too, had had fears about securing its natural resources needs said Mr
Kloppers.

“In time, and on the basis of experience, Japan came to trust markets to deliver the raw materials it needed.”

Mr Kloppers also highlighted the deficiencies of the annual iron ore
negotiations to set a benchmark price, which ended in acrimony this
year when the large mining groups refused to give Chinese steelmakers
bigger price cuts than had already been agreed with other steelmakers.

In contrast, the price-setting mechanism for ex-change-traded
commodities was “very transparent, accessible to multiple parties and
fully reflects global supply and demand dynamics,” he said

“Commercial market mechanisms will ensure that developing nations’ raw
material demand is met, that suppliers obtain sufficient investment to
meet demand and that new deposits of raw materials are discovered.”

Australia’s mining sector is expected to benefit materially from rising demand from Asia, led by China.

“Beyond this colossal size, the mining sector is growing at almost
twice the rate as the rest of the economy,” said Mr Kloppers said.

Source: Financial Times

Search to find what you want

• BHP Chief Says \ u0026quot; Clean Demand \ u0026 # 39; will not return This Year

    BHP Billiton Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Marius Kloppers said global demand for metals won’t rise beyond what is required to rebuild stockpiles for the remainder of this year.  “We won’t see clean demand until early next year,” Kloppers, head of the world’s biggest mining company, told reporters in Johannesburg today. “Stocking

• BHP Chief Says \ u0026quot; Clean Demand \ u0026 # 39; will not return This Year

    BHP Billiton Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Marius Kloppers said global demand for metals won’t rise beyond what is required to rebuild stockpiles for the remainder of this year.  “We won’t see clean demand until early next year,” Kloppers, head of the world’s biggest mining company, told reporters in Johannesburg today. “Stocking

• BHP Chief Says will not return This Year

    BHP Billiton Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Marius Kloppers said global demand for metals won’t rise beyond what is required to rebuild stockpiles for the remainder of this year.  “We won’t see clean demand until early next year,” Kloppers, head of the world’s biggest mining company, told reporters in Johannesburg today. “Stocking

• Iron ore prices in the direction of greater transparency – BHP Billiton

    Iron-ore pricing is heading towards greater transparency, BHP Billiton CEO Marius Kloppers said last week. Kloppers told journalists in Johannesburg that steel-pricing dynamics had changed towards shorter contracts. In the seventies, many products, including oil, copper, aluminium and nickel, were sold on a benchmark-pricing basis. But, over time, the processing step

• Iron ore prices in the direction of greater transparency – BHP Billiton

    Iron-ore pricing is heading towards greater transparency, BHP Billiton CEO Marius Kloppers said last week. Kloppers told journalists in Johannesburg that steel-pricing dynamics had changed towards shorter contracts. In the seventies, many products, including oil, copper, aluminium and nickel, were sold on a benchmark-pricing basis. But, over time, the processing step

• Velocity of BHP Says China Surprising Recovery

    BHP Billiton Ltd., the world’s largest mining company, has been surprised by the rapid recovery in China’s economy after the global financial crisis curbed prices and cut demand. “Over the past six months, we have seen quite a rebound in commodity prices and in particular, the velocity of the recovery

• Profit increase in iron ore and coal is expected to continue

    BHP Billiton’s profit surge in its iron ore and coal divisions is expected to continue, with the world’s largest miner confident the recent increase in demand for its products will continue. The commodity price slump hit the miner’s net profit hard but it was its iron ore and metallurgical coal divisions

• Deadline looms for BHP Billiton, Rio JV

    BHP Billiton Ltd and Rio Tinto Ltd are working around the clock to secure a binding agreement for their proposed $US116 billion ($A125.09 billion) iron ore joint venture in Western Australia by Saturday’s self-imposed deadline, according to insiders. The joint venture, which would combine the two companies’ iron ore operations

• Insists Rio Tinto, BHP joint venture on the right track

    The world’s largest miner BHP Billiton Thursday said its iron ore joint venture with Rio Tinto was on track, dismissing speculation the deal could be shelved. Outgoing BHP chairman Don Argus said both companies remained committed to the tie-up, aimed at savings worth an estimated 10 billion US dollars, despite

• BHP chief sitting on a goldmine, if his shares to pay off prices in the long run

    Marius Kloppers, chief executive of BHP Billiton, could receive a ?27.5 million windfall from his share bonuses if the world’s largest mining group meets its performance targets. BHP revealed yesterday that Mr Kloppers has earned 1.23 million shares over the past five years as part of his long-term incentive plan.

• BHP iron ore exec says reform could have prevented Rio case

    BHP Billiton on Sunday called for more transparent iron ore pricing, saying it would help prevent situations such as the arrest of Rio Tinto executive Stern Hu in China. BHP’s chief financial officer Alex Vanselow said the world’s largest miner believed iron ore should be a traded commodity, rather than having prices

• India: \ u0026quot; Spot prices for iron ore picks

    Indian iron ore miners have always shown a distinct preference for trade in the spot market rather than entering into yearly contracts with their clients on benchmark rates. This is despite the fact that for nearly four decades, the major part of the global iron ore trade is conducted on

• EU, the question of how Rio, BHP in iron ore merger press

    MINING giants BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto say they are on track to nut out the finer points of their $US116 billion ($137.8bn) merger of their West Australian iron ore operations by the end of this year — but are still in the dark on how the EU will deal

• Kloppe Says BHP has no intention to cash investors

    BHP Billiton Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Marius Kloppers said the world’s largest mining company doesn’t have plans to return any surplus cash to shareholders. “At this point in time we have no plans to return any surplus cash,” Kloppers said in a Bloomberg Television interview in London yesterday. “We believe

• China acts tough in front of iron ore talks

    China is at it again. This year also China has decided to take a hardline as far as iron ore price negotiations are concerned. Even before the Beijing starts its 2010 iron ore annual contract price negotiations in April with the big three global iron ore-mining giants, the country has