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Four steel giants seek BoI breaks |
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Four world-class steelmakers - ArcelorMittal, Japan's Nippon Steel and JFE Steel and China's Baosteel - have expressed interest in tapping the Board of Investment's tax incentives for their upstream blast furnaces. According to BoI secretary-general Satit Charnjavanakul, all four have submitted letters of interest to the state agency, which were open for submission through this past Thursday. ArcelorMittal is the world's largest steelmaker on the Fortune Global 500 list, followed by Nippon Steel, JFE Steel, South Korea's Posco Steel and Baosteel. The furnaces are expected to require an investment of over Bt100 billion each. Satit said yesterday that the BoI had not yet drafted the details of investment privileges for interested steelmakers. The process now involves the four collaborating with the National Economic and Social Development Board (NESDB) and the BoI to find appropriate locations for their steel plants. Each plant will require an area of 5,000 to 10,000 rai for a minimum production capacity of 2 million tonnes of premium-grade upstream steel per year. While saying that it would take around six to 12 months to search for appropriate locations, Satit noted that the Eastern seaboard could be too crowded for such giant new investment projects. He added that the projects were likely to be located on the Southern Seaboard. According to Satit, the new steel plants will be required to use advanced production technology in order to prevent environmental destruction and create harmony with communities. He said Sahaviriya Steel had also expressed interest to the BoI in an upstream steel blast furnace. However, its project was not approved because it did not meet the BoI's conditions. "Sahaviriya can continue with its project, but it will not receive any incentives from us," he said.
At
present, domestic steel demand is estimated at 12.5 million
to 13 million tonnes per annum. While 4.5 million tonnes are
of premium grade for the automobile, electric and
canned-food sectors, the rest is for construction purposes. |
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The Nation, 02.02.2008 |
