The Shandong Department of Land and Resources has issued a circular on strengthening the management of coal mines.

SDLF is calling for strict control over the approval process for new coal mine projects. No new mining rights will be approved in certain forbidden geographic areas and current mining enterprises in those areas have been advised to shutdown.

Small coal mines whose production is below 300000 tons per year, gesso mines whose output is below 150000 tons per year and stone mines whose yields are below 20000 steres per year will not be approved in the future.

In the meantime, those existing small mines that fall into these three categories will be closed by September 2007 when the total number of mines in the province will be reduced by over 15%.