According to the 2030 Mining Plan, a document being drawn up by the Ministry for Mining and Energy, iron ore production in Brazil is expected to more than double over the next 20 years.
The study, which is in its review stage and which is expected to be published in the second half of August, points to iron ore production of 1 billion tonnes as compared to current production of between 380 and 400 million tonnes.
Mr Fernando Ffreitas Lins director of the secretariat for geology, mining and mineral transformation of the Ministry for Mining and Energy said that the increase in production in the country was due to demand from Chinese companies. The Plan outlines production of 585 million tonnes of iron ore in 2015 and 785 million tonnes in 2022.
During a conference at the Congress of the Brazilian Association of Metallurgy, Materials and mining, Mr Freitas Lins said that projections were based on average world growth of 3.8% and of 5.1% in Brazil over the next few years. Currently, a significant amount of the ore produced by Brazilian mining company Vale is exported to the Chinese market.