Vale says it is happy to help China develop new sources of iron ore, but is currently focused on restoring production volumes.

“This is obviously an extremely important topic, the Chinese investment in mining,” Rogerio Nogueira, marketing director, iron ore at Vale, told the Singapore Iron Ore Forum.

“We understand that resources in our industry are finite and there needs to be a constant development of new resources in new regions, because there is a natural depletion of mineral resources.