Weekly Report - 8 February 2007

CUBA | Boosting nickel output. Cuba will invest US$300m to expand its nickel industry, according to a brief news item in Prensa Latina this week. It did not say as much but it looks like this investment will be coming from Venezuela. Cuba signed a US$521m deal with Venezuela last week to complete the Las Camarioca ferro-nickel plant in eastern Holguí­n province. Venezuela is taking over from China's state-owned Minmetals Corp. which, in 2004, sealed a US$500m investment deal with Cuba, but nothing happened. Cuba reckons Las Camarioca could produce 68,000 tonnes of ferro-nickel annually which will be used to produce stainless steel in a planned US$600m steel plant in Venezuela.