By Silvia Antonioli
NEW YORK, June 20 (Reuters) – India’s Jindal Steel Power
(JSPL) has started looking for alternative coal and
iron ore projects to its $2.1 billion Bolivian project after a
disagreement with the country’s government over power supplies,
the company’s chairman and managing director told Reuters on
Wednesday.
The company has shifted its focus away from Bolivia after
giving the government notice to terminate its iron ore and steel
investment in the country due to the lack of support from the
government.
It is now looking elsewhere in South America, as well as
Africa and Australia, Naveen Jindal said in an interview on the
sidelines of the AMM Steel Success Strategies conference.
“For the last five years we were so focused on Bolivia that
we stopped looking as well, but now we are looking elsewhere. We
know we can make it happen elsewhere,” he said.
The search for raw materials is also part of the company’s
aim to raise its raw materials self-sufficiency level to 80-90
percent by 2015. That is up from 70 percent currently.
The project in Bolivia – the country’s single largest
foreign investment – will be scrapped unless the government
offers more support and accepts a smaller version of the
original plan due to the smaller than previously expected gas
availability, Jindal said.
“If they respond to that favorably, then we can talk. We are
keen to do the project, but on fair terms so if they offer one
fourth of the amount of gas which they had promised before, they
have to realizes that the whole project has to be reconfigured,”
Jindal said.
Continued…
