Rio Tinto is not worried about falling ore prices

Rio Tinto's head of iron ore sales, Andrew Harding, says he is not worried about a sharp drop in iron ore prices for at least the next two years.

Despite the 2.7 percent drop in the price of the steelmaking ingredient throughout the day, all the way to $ 105 a tonne, Andrew Harding said he is focusing on long-term urbanization trends in China rather than short-term volatility. Since this is a temporary phenomenon.

"At this point you are watching one of the stories where the price of iron ore went down, but is this the end of the world?" Said Harding in Perth and added: "I am not paying attention to it."
"When the price of iron ore goes up, I feel good. When the price of iron ore goes down, I am not happy about it, but this is the reality, and what I really care about is the long-term issues."

In the long term, Andrew Harding said, the indicators based on his observation of urbanization in China plus the percentage of the population that live in cities should be strong for at least another ten years.

At the same time, Rio Tinto is cutting jobs at its coal mine in central Queensland to protect a sector that is gearing up for further product price reductions. At the same time, Rio did not disclose the scale of job cuts, which reaches more than 950 employees at the mine. Metallurgical coal prices fell to $ 100 per tonne from over $ 300 in 2011. And the price is expected to drop to $ 90 /t in the June quarter.