Half the world’s tin is produced by state-run enterprise and part of the remainder is produced by private

companies in wich the state plays a significant role. The move in recent years has been towards public
ownership of national tin mining industries. This move has not been at the expense of the big mining
MNC’s since they have not been as involved in the mining of the tin as they have of other allied metals.
In facts, the MNC’s have become more closely involved with tin once the process of nationalization has
got under way and their management skills have been called upon. The degree of success of the state
mining corporation has been mixed. It is possible that the relatively small scale of individual tin deposits
mitigates against the success of the large corporations whose scale can make them insensitive to the
specific requirements of individual sites. The effect of growing public ownership in the tin industry in the
availability of capital for investment is equally unclear. International governmental aid may be more
readily available to a national enterprise than to one In private hands and even componensate for
exclusion from access to domestic and overseas private capital. Attemps by the American security at a
purely economic levels consultans found the private sector much more worthy of capital injection. Signs
suggest that the real weakness of those nationalized tin minig corporations whose functioning is open to
inspection lies in their inability to develop new reserves. It has not always proved easy for politicans to
appreciate the need for, and to justify, the expenditure of scarce funds of chancy exploration ventures at
that expense of achieving more immediate results in the frequently limited lifetime of national
government. Once the error of sacrificing expenditure on exploration is appreciated, a role frequently
emerged for the ming MNC’s, which can normally bring to bear a frequently emerges for the mining
MNC’s, which can normally bring to bear a much wider experience in the establishment and
development of new reserves than that possessed by the nationalized concern =. And by restricting their
role to the discovery and proving of fresh reserves, they avoid the popular odium of being cast as
international robbers of national inheritance more interested in private gain than public benefit. It is still
easy, nevertheless, for mining MNC’s to become scapegoats for bad government or find themselves
persona non grata with new regimes, and the corporatons have to be careful in safeguarding themselves
against the consequences of bad faith of successor government. In geberal, the international mining
houses command more resources than do even the larger organizational units in the tin mining
economy. The three largest units outside th USSR are the Indonesia PT Tambang Timah corporation with
a tin production of 24000 tonnes in 1978, comibol (21500 tonnes), and the Malaysian mining
corporation (19000 tonnes), with turn overs that fell within the range of US$250 to 300 million. In
contrast, consolidated goldfields (with a 36 per cent interest in the renison mine) had a turnover of
almost $2000 million, as kid Kennecott copper and Asarco; the alumunium giants – alcoa, Kaiser and
Reynolds – al exceede that figure and the turnover of the big steel companies dwarfed even those, by
comparison even large tin corporation are relatively small fry in the intenational mining pond.

The average working unit in tin is also relatively small. The biggest underground mines – catavia in
Bolivia, renison in Tasmania – each handled about 600000 tonnes of rock in 1978 and renison produced
5300 tonnes of tin worth about $67 million; the biggest tin dredge is capable of an annual throughput of
eight million cubic metres and a productions of 1500-2000 tonnes of tin. But the number of mines
producing 1000 tonnes of tih a year can be counted on the fingers of a pairs of hands and the 205
dredges operating in south-east asia in 1978 each produced an average of only 360 tonnes of tin in
concentrates valued at about $4,6 million. The gravel pumpa are much smaller units; 1200 were working
in 1978, each producing an average of 44 tonnes of tin with a market value $572000. Nor is productivity
high , even excluding the peasant miners. The average underground miner produces 1.7 tonnes of tin a
year; his acounterpart on a dredge 2.2 tonnes;; and gravel pump operators only one tonne of tin per
worker.

Tin ore is low grade ore. About one quarter of the tin produced is from lode mines and emerges from the
ground in material in that nowadays is considered rich if it contains one pre cent tin. The average grade
of ground worker by many Malaysian dredges is currently as low as 02 lb/yd 3 or seven parts in every
100000 by weight. The mill handling material from the ardlethan open pit in Australian treated of one
tonne of tin for every 343 tonnes of material handled; in grades are perhaps 225 per cent below those of
the years ago.

The lean grade of most ores makes for aprticular problems in processing concentrate. All the ore is
turned into concentrate at the minhead, on the dredge or, in general, at the site of production. This
means that the concentrating mills are dispersed and handle relatively small volumes of ore. Some are
highly efficient, being precisely adjusted to the particular characterisctics of the local ore; ather are
inefficient. The processes employed are in large part mechanized versions of the gravitational sorting
techniques employed by the pre-industrial miners of Europe. These ancient techniques are more widely
employed in the tin industry than in those of other non-ferrous minerals, partly because cassiterite has a
relatively high density compared with the ores of most other mineral ores and make the old procces
more effective in tin. As yet there has been very little application for non- gravimetric methods in the
tinfieldds of the world. This means that the processing of ore is still one in which the individual skill and
attention negligible role to date. Techniques long employed in the processing of other minerals have
made little headway in the modern tin mining industry. Flotation is employed in a few of the mills
attached to the underground mines where the head carries a more complex range of minerals and where
fine grinding is needed to liberate the cassiterite fragments. Volatization has so far gained only very
limited application; it is expensive of energy and has yet to prove economical in the market economies
outside the USSR.

The tin smelting industry is more footloose in its location. Historically, heavy transport cost have meant
that tin concentrates were smelted on the spot, but the cost of transporting bulky ores has fallen. With
could grow large and enjoy economies of scale. The tin smelters have have traditionally been
independent of both the mines and the tin consuming industries. Tin smelting has been a toll
arrangement in which a service was provide to the tin producers for a fixed charge independent of the
price of tin. The smelters have traditionally helped to event out the cash flow of mining companies by
advancing money on the strength of concentrates held. Marketing has not been a function of the
smelters.

The distribution of smelters at the end of the first half of the 20 th century illustrates their freedom to
locate almost at will. Half the world’s tin smelting capacity was situated in the tinfields – notably in
Malaya – and the other half in the industrial the world – notably in the former imperial countries of
western Europe. The smelters in Singapore and penang , financed by british capital, drew upon Malaya
production (thanks to an export levy on concentratres) and that OF UPN MALAY PRODUCTION ( thank to
an export levy on concentrates) and that of thailand. Bolivian and Nigeria concentrate came to Britain;
half of Indonesian concentrates were smelted in the Netherlands and those from the Belgian congo in
continental Europe.