The Hindu Business Line : Coal India, MMTC in talks to source China tyres

Kolkata, April 9 MMTC’s plan to grab a pie of the tyre market in India through imports from China seems to have been gaining momentum. Coal India Ltd has initiated discussion with the trading house for acting as a canalising agency for sourcing very high tonnage OTR (off-the-road) tyres, used in mining equipment, from China.

According to sources, Coal India is facing a shortage in supply of OTR tyres of 85 tonne and above load-bearing capacity. Such tyres are not manufactured in India and are sourced from global majors like Bridgestone, Michelin and Goodyear.

Price range

The average price tag of such tyres ranges between approximately Rs 3-6 lakh depending upon the load bearing capacity. “We require approximately 3,000 high tonnage OTR tyres annually. We have entered into a long-term agreement with Mitsui for supplying roughly 500 Bridgestone tyres annually. The rest is sourced from other companies through global tenders, a CIL source said.

“However, there is acute shortage of such tyres and our last tender for 120-190 tonne tyres did not find any participants. Accordingly, we could not meet our entire requirement during the last fiscal,” the source added. There is, however, no imminent crisis for below-85-tonne OTR tyres.

Domestic producers

There is also an arrangement in place with BEML to encourage domestic producers in manufacturing such tyres. However, supplies are yet to materialise through such arrangement.

As a counter strategy, CIL had recently invited a few interested Chinese tyre makers to send their product in high tonnage category for a trial run. As per the conditions, CIL will use select Chinese products for a one-year performance trial, following which the successful products and companies will be allowed to participate in CIL tenders.

More Stories on : Tyres | Coal | Exports & Imports

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page