"The government is committed to provide raw material support. What we need is investment for people living in mining areas," said G Srinivas, state steel & mines secretary at a seminar organised by Federation of Indian Mineral Industries (FIMI) here.
During the seminar, he said the state government is aware of the problems faced by miners and would surely take steps to bring 'normalcy' for the sector.
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"About 80 per cent of non-tax revenue comes from the mining sector, so the state government will take steps to to bring normalcy for the mining industry. We have also asked the authorities not to ban mining in Odisha as there is no large scale illegal mining," he said at the FIMI seminar on 'Raw Material for Steel Industry'.
He, however, said that miners must keep in mind the mineral output restrictions imposed on them.
At the meeting, Srinivas said, the state government will complete the roadmap for creating a resource corridor in the mineral rich region by end of this year to support the clogged up mineral logistics.
"We will complete the project planning for resource corridor by end of this year," he said.
Last year, the state government engaged World Bank to prepare a report on efficient mineral administration, strengthening of state-owned Odisha Mining Corporation (OMC), resource corridor in the mine rich Joda-Jajpur belt and on mining revenue collection.
The World Bank team today discussed with state government officials about the project report on resource corridor.
Odisha produced nearly 78 million tonne of iron ore in 2013-14, as per provisional official figures. However, most of the raw material could not be sold out of Odisha due to a controversial rule imposed by state government on reservation of half of the monthly output for local steel industries. Miners said due to limited selling opportunities inside the state, huge stock of iron ore got stacked at the mines pit head, making it inconvenient for miners to excavate the mineral.
"I therefore feel it is very necessary that the restriction imposed by the Odisha governmen should be withdrawn to ease production," said B C Daga, president of FIMI during his speech in the seminar.
Apart from steel industry and iron ore mining, the situation for other minerals is not rosy either. Mining companies said despite abundant availability of manganese and chromite in the country, ferroalloy industries are importing the minerals.
"Domestic ferroalloy industry should be persuaded to utilise domestic ore rather than imported ore," Daga added. In 2012-13, India imported 2.3 million tonne of manganese ore and 210,000 tonne of chromite ore , FIMI data said.