Tungsten Market is subject to supply cutbacks

China, who holds a monopoly on the supply of tungsten, churned out 84,470 tonnes of tungsten concentrates last year. This figure was up by 5.01 per cent YoY; however the figure shows a 10.71 per cent contraction MoMo, December 2008 vs. December 2007. In 2008, yield of tungsten concentrates in Hunan Province dropped 10.86 per cent YoY to 27,590 tonnes accounting for 32.7 per cent of the total output while it in Jiangxi Province has notched up by 5.52 per cent YoY to 39,306 tonnes which takes up 46.5 per cent of the total. The whole tonnages in Hunan and Jiangxi contributed as high as 79.2 per cent to the state annual production of tungsten concentrates.