China exported 4.017 million tons of coal in July, 1.318 million tons less than June, and 852,000 tons less than a year ago. Statistics show that coal export totaled 29.572 million tons in January-July, down 0.4 percent from a year earlier.

    The statistics came from four major export-oriented Chinese companies, namely, China National Coal Group Corp., Shenhua Group Corporation. Limited, Shanxi Coal Imp. & Exp. Group Co., LTD., and China Minmetals Corporation. Coal export from Shanxi Coal in July dropped by 35.2 percent from the same last year period, but still higher than the other three ones; yet its accumulated export volume between January and July increased by 37.3 percent.

    Meanwhile, both Shenhua and China Minmetals saw a decrease of seven percent or so and China National Coal Group experienced a small increase of 2.3 percent in January-July over that of last year.

    Main reasons for such decline in Chinese coal export included the continuous price rise in the domestic coal market of China, the price fall in the global coal market and delay in the release of the second-passel coal export quota.

    According to China's State Administration of Coal Mine Safety,raw coal output totaled 234.031 million tons in July, and over 1.5 billion tons between January and July, up 10.2 percent and 11.4 percent year on year, respectively.