Market and product

(VEN) - Despitebeing a key economic sector and receiving top priority from the localauthorities, the mining sector in Ha Giang Province has been still undevelopedin comparison with its potentials and produced low economic value. To help thesector make larger contribution to the province Gross Domestic Products (GDP),it is necessary to renew technology and plan material supply areas.

There are 175mining sites of 28 types of minerals in Ha Giang Province. Among those, 53mining sites under management of 40 businesses have received mining permitsfrom the Ha Giang Province People's Committee and the Ministry of NaturalResources and Environment. Those mining sites focus on iron, manganese, lead,zinc, tin, wolfram, mica and kaolin … The mining sector contributes 20-25percent GDP annually and creates jobs for thousands of labors with salary ofVND1.5-3.2 million per person per month. The sector has helped the provinceeliminate hunger and reduce poverty and improve infrastructure system.

Since theInvestment Law and new Mineral Law took effect, a wave of investment inthe mining sector has been risen attracting participation of many largebusinesses. Large factories such as Mau Due Antimony Factory (in Yen MinhDistrict) with a capacity of nearly 1,000 tonnes per year, Na Son Lead, ZincFactory (in Vi Xuyen District) at a capacity of 800 tonnes per day, Ta PanFactory in Bac Me District at a capacity of 300 tonnes per day have beenestablished.

However, Luu TungGiang, the Deputy Director of Ha Giang Department of Industry and Trade, saidthat most of those businesses lack capital, experiences and human resources toinvest in mining, hence, producing low efficiency. In addition, the lack ofgeographical information has created many difficulties for businesses to buildbusiness directions and invest in technology, make plan on mining andprocessing minerals. All factories have small scale and have not yet cooperatedtogether to strengthen competitiveness in the market. Advanced technology hasnot been adopted, thus, those factories have eliminated a large amount oftoxic chemical and polluted the environment. Their main products are rawmaterials, thus, having low and unstable economic value, wasting national naturalresources.

Ha Giangstrives to become an industrial highlight among northern provinces and willcontinue to focus on mining industry with the purpose of meeting internationalstandards. According to statistics, Ha Giang is listed on top five provinces iniron reserves. The iron reserve in the province can provide materials for ironproducing at a capacity from one million tonnes per year. Thus, it is obviousthat Ha Giang has favorable conditions to build and develop the metallurgysector in the coming time.

Luu Tung Giangsaid that the province will take initiative to exchange information, applyadvanced technology in the field of mining and processing minerals, purchasinghigh capacity equipment which consumes less energy. In terms of material supplyarea planning, the province will give priority on small mining sites to providematerials for large capacity factories which do not pollute the environment.Intensive processing factories will be built to produce highcompetitiveness products in regional and international market.

To help themining sector to promote its potential, Luu Tung Giang stated that there is aneed to have open policies to encourage businesses to renew technology, improveskills for managers and labors. In addition, a sci-tech market serving miningdevelopment should be developed and policy system on this market should beimproved to promote its development. The government should make policies tostrengthen cooperation between programs on developing mining sector andprojects on producing industrial equipment, building criteria on assessingtechnological modernization level (such as energy and materials consumptionlevel) and regulations on checking, assessing and supervising implementation ofthose criteria./.