China gobbles Amazon rainforest ore to clean its polluted skies

Rio de Janeiro

A BID by China to clean up pollution in its biggest cities and industrial towns is fuelling a push to mine resource riches on the other side of the globe in the Amazon rainforest - one of the most environmentally sensitive areas on Earth.

Smog-laden skies across the world's most-populated country prompted the government to impose curbs on a domestic steel industry that uses coal-fired blast furnaces to melt iron ore. That's led to increased demand for higher-grade ore from overseas that can produce more steel with fewer emissions, and profit margins on those shipments have surged.

Exports by Brazil, one of the biggest suppliers, are headed for a fourth straight record in 2017. Top producer Vale SA is shifting production from low-grade reserves in the southeast that have been mined for a century to develop more high-grade deposits in the isolated northern r…