India's Department of Fertilisers raised concerns with the country's Foreign Affairs minister on Thursday over 2011 prices set by Canpotex, the company that markets and distributes Saskatchewan's potash globally. India's farming co-ops have halted imports due to the impasse and while waiting for a government decision on import subsidies. At over 6 million tonnes/year India is the biggest importer but says it pays much higher prices than a country like China can negotiate.

Mining technology developer Maptek, has released Vulcan 8.1 to its 5500-strong global user base, providing new engineering functionality for underground stope studies, scheduling tools for open pit operations and a host of enhancements to existing features.

It is now possible to use measurement devices based on impedance tomography to create real-time 3D images from inside the pipelines and tanks used by the processing industries. One significant application for this technology, spearheaded by the Finnish company Numcore Oy, is concentration plants in the mining industry.

Liebherr has renewed its technical and licensing agreement with equipment simulator manufacturer Immersive Technologies for a second five-year period.

After surging last week, industry bellwether Molycorp led a slide in rare earth mining stocks with a 5% drop by early afternoon on Thursday on news China is raising REE export quotas for the second half of the year in reaction to a WTO ruling. The exact impact of the decision is not yet clear: the new quotas only bring 2011 exports in line with last year prompting the EU to call it "highly disappointing." And fresh data from Lynas Corporation, world no. 2 outside China, show the price of a basket of eight REEs jumping 140% in just over two months.

Richard Burton appeared on Dick Cavett's show in 1980 and told the story about his family of Welsh coal miners. Listen to a riveting history about those who loved the mines and what that work cost them.

Industries suffering from skills shortages in Australia (mining and minerals processing, utilities, communications, construction, manufacturing, tourism and hospitality) are being supported by employment agencies, moving to offer the training required to close the gap, reports The Gympie Times.

The current skill shortages are due to a persistent decline in the apprenticeship training rate and a sustained high level of output for most of the last decade across the industries that employ a high proportion of tradespeople, says Dr Phil Toner, senior researcher for the Australian Expert Group in Industry Studies. Dr Towner said the reduced training rate was caused by changes in the economy over the past two decades, including changes in demographics, school retention rates, privatisation and corporatisation of public utilities, and outsourcing. With state and federal funding, agencies like Employment Services Queensland are upskilling the unemployed to reverse this trend.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) squared off, probably for the last time, at a congressional hearing on Wednesday on whether gold can be considered money. Paul, who belongs to the libertarian wing of the Republican party and is currently running for the the Republican presidential nomination, expressed his sentiments about gold and the Federal Reserve in the books End The Fed and the Case for Gold.

CONSOL Energy Inc. (NYSE: CNX), updates on second quarter 2011 operations. From the release: "CONSOL Energy's Coal Division reports total coal production of 15.4 million tons for the quarter, including 1.4 million tons of low-vol metallurgical coal