Brazilian miner giant Companhia Vale do Rio Doce (CVRD) announced on Monday that it will buy Austria's AMCI Holdings Australia Pty in cash in an effort to boost its presence in coal mining.

The CVRD, the world's largest iron ore producer and exporter, will pay 661 million U.S. dollars to buy the Australian company while assuming a debt of 124 million dollars from the latter as part of the deal, said a statement issued by the CVRD.

The AMCI, a privately held company headquartered in Australia's Queensland, operates and controls coal assets through unincorporated joint ventures. The company's stake is equivalent to an annual production capacity of 8 million tons of coal with reserves of 103 million tons.

The deal serves as an important part of CVRD's growth strategy to strengthen itself in coal mining and diversity its product portfolio.

As now the world's No. 2 mining company after its purchase of Canadian nickel miner Inco Ltd. last year, the CVRD also said it is concluding a feasibility study on the development of a large coal deposit in Mozambique and a pre-feasibility study on a deposit in Australia's Bowen Basin.

Source: Xinhua