According to provisional data from market operator mjunction, indicating weak prices continue to attract buyers even as a local shortage lingers, India's import of coal and coke rose 12% to 18.5 million tonnes in June from a year earlier.
Asia's third-largest economy is the world's No. 3 buyer of coal from countries like Indonesia, Australia and South Africa as power plants that burn the fuel raise generation to try and meet the electricity needs of the country's 1.2 billion people.
Mr Viresh Oberoi, chief executive of mjunction, said that "We also feel that imports would continue to rise in the immediate short term because of prevailing attractive prices and possibility of further softness in international prices, mainly due to the China factor and comparatively low demand from European utilities."
China, the world's largest coal buyer, imported 24.01 million tonnes of coal in May, down 11.4% from April, figures from the General Administration of Customs of China showed.
Prices of thermal coal, used in power generation, have fallen about 40% in the last three years due to abundant supplies in Australia and Indonesia and slowing demand in Europe and China.
According to mjunction, India's imports of thermal coal, used in power generation, rose 11% to 14.77 million tonnes in June, a JV of TATA Steel and Steel Authority of India Limited.
According to mjunction's figures based on monitoring of vessels' positions and data from shipping companies, shipments of steelmaking coking coal rose 5% to 2.93 million.
India's government does not release import data regularly.Mjunction said that apart from thermal and coking coal, the total import figure includes anthracite, coke a processed form of coal and other such varieties. June shipments were the highest in 2014.
Source:- steelguru.com
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