The legal obstacles to be overcome before opening a natural stone quarry in Russia are explained. Investments will not be forthcoming without a resolution to these problems. Meanwhile the country´s stone processing factories have to rely to an increasing extent on imports. In this report*, I.O. Sinelnikov & O.B. Sinelnikov propose some practical solutions. (*This article was translated from the Russian original in Gorny Zhurnal 2009, No.3, and appears here by kind permission of the publishers and authors.)

Trade statistics of Turkey´s natural stone industry, being highly exported oriented, help to understand the dynamism of the markets for stone all over the world. We publish the exports figures for 2009.

The Brazilian exports of ornamental rocks ended 2009 with a sales figure of US$ 724.1 million, corresponding to the commercialisation of 1,672,624 tons of diverse products. Compared to 2008, these exports figures meant a fall of 24.15% in sales and of 15.94% in total physical volume, numbers that were less than that of 2005.

The Republic of Serbia has limited domestic resources of dimension / decorative stone in volume terms. Below, the Chairman of the Stone Association of Serbia, Zoran Djajic, and the Publisher of KAMEN trade journal, Zika Milovanovic, summarize current knowledge of the sector.

• YESTERDAY- Buyers at the door.
• TOMORROW- Sellers at the door.

• YESTERDAY- Production Manager. 
• TOMORROW-The Sales Person.

• YESTERDAY- 2º quality.  
• TOMORROW- different tone.

• YESTERDAY- We have a big factory. 
• TOMORROW- We have a big showroom.

• YESTERDAY- Extended payment terms.
• TOMORROW- Payment guaranteed.

• YESTERDAY- China. 
• TOMORROW- China, China, India, India.

Ganesh Kumar Murugan

In the last decade, Brazil has introduced hundreds of new dimension stones in the market. In fact, the number of Brazilian launches, in such a short period of time, have surpassed those of all Europe over the last two hundred years.

The  Association of the Businessmen of Marble from Andalusia (AEMA) celebrated the prize awarding ceremony of the Macael Awards, in its XX1V edition. Below we present a photo report of the winners in the different categories. 

AWARD TO THE ARCHITECT
 

Andrew V. Giambertone, of New York, for the projection given to marble and natural stones by the correct use. He is specialised in uniquely exceptional residential buildings and masterly complexes. 

Exports
 

The developments of the Brazilian exports of ornamental rocks in 2008 reflected the crisis in the housing market in the United States and the world economic recession. Exports reached the figure of US$ 954 million, corresponding to sales of slightly less than 2 million tons, which meant a negative variation of 13, 17% and 20, 98% respectively, with respect to 2007. 

The scientific name Porphyry, in the modern scientific classification of rocks, it is used only as a commercial term to indicate a volcanic rock with peculiar characteristics and susceptible to particular uses. The classic porphyry and trentine is the volcanic rock coming from the Italian region of Trentino- Alto Adige.