The government on Thursday announced that state-owned Coal India is likely to enter the international market.

"We may enter the international market in 2004 itself. Australia and South Africa appear to be good destinations," Minister of State for Coal and Mines Dasari Narayan Rao said.

However, he said the plans were still at a "conceptional stage and we are looking at all options."

Asserting that plans for revival of Eastern Coalfields and Bharat Coking Coal were afoot, Rao said a slew of Coal India projects entailing an investment of about Rs 3000 crore (Rs 30 billion) were on the anvil and would be cleared through a single-window system.

Coal India has submitted proposals for 28 coal projects. Each one requires an investment of over Rs 100 crore (Rs 1 billion) and has to be cleared by various agencies, he said.

As regards the revival plans for Eastern Coalfields, Asansol and Bharat Coking Coal, Dhanbad, Rao said the ministry would put up the proposal to the Board of Financial and Industrial Reconstruction again.

As part of the revival plan, BCCL's capacity is proposed to be augmented from the current 24 million tonnes to 38.6 million tonnes by infusing a total of Rs 4,105 crore (Rs 41.05 billion).

ECL's capacity will be enhanced to 38 million tonnes from its current 20 million tonnes and the required investment as part of the package is estimated to be around Rs 3,800 crore, (Rs 38 billion) he said.

The minister said that though coal production in the country has consistently been good over the years, the demand has also gone up simultaneously. "There is small gap between production and demand," he said.

CIL has revised its target estimate for coal production from 306 million tonnes to 331 million tonnes in 2004.