The World Gold Council (WGC) speculates that in the next ten years the demand for precious metals like gold will double in China. This will make it the second highest gold consumer in the world. India is currently the biggest consumer of gold in the world.

The demand for gold among buyers is increasing rapidly in China despite the rising gold prices. The demand is likely to rise in future also, according to the report released by London-based organisation World Gold Council on Monday. It was organisation’s first report on the gold market in China. The report, which was titled as “Gold in the Year of the Tiger” said that in the last 5 years, gold demand in China has risen at a rate of 13% per annum in China. In 2007, the country was the biggest gold producer in the world.

Last year, 462 tonnes of gold was consumed in China. The total value of the gold consumed in China was $14 billion which was 11% of demand of gold globally. The report has predicted that in the next decade, this demand will increase two folds.

Albert Cheng who is the managing director for Far East office of WGC stated that the growth in gold consumption has come from various sectors like private investment, central and industrial banks, apart from jewellery industry. People’s Bank of China is holding around 1.6 percent of entire gold reserves in China. This ratio is pretty low by international standards.

Interestingly, China is the biggest US treasury bonds holder in the world. With the rising volatility in the rates of US dollar, China may start using gold as its alternative choice of investment, the report stated. It said, “With total reserves of $2.4 trillion, China still has the ‘fire power’ left in its books should the country decide to increase its gold allocation.”

But, vice governor of central bank of China, Yi Gang has recently said that China would never consider gold as a prominent investment channel for foreign reserves.

India has always been a country dominated by agriculture. The land has given many natural resources to its people who use them not only to sustain themselves in today’s ever changing world but also sell the refined form of these natural resources to other countries of the world.
Copper ore, bauxite and iron ore are the three main natural resources found in Indian territory. Among these three, iron sees the maximum production here and is exported to rest of the world via the sea route. Orissa and Bihar are the two major iron producing states. In fact, southern Orissa employees thousands of people who mine almost a quarter of iron produced by the country as a whole.
Diamonds, gold and silver make up a small part of other natural resources found here. The state of Rajasthan is famous all over the world for the qualitative gem stones that are found in abundance here.
Coal is the major raw material for producing energy. According to a rough estimate, India has around 135 billion tons of coal in reserve, enough to last for more than 100 years. Though the coastal areas of Maharashtra and Gujarat have huge reserves of petroleum and other natural gases, it is not enough to meet the day to day requirement of the country. For its fuel, India is dependent on Middle East countries.
Recent years have seen a significant rise in production of electrical energy through nuclear energy. Few decades back, the industry was run only by hydroelectric power and coal. Himalayan region generates more than half of hydroelectric power though dams. The water thus collected is made available for irrigation and drinking purposes.
In most of the Indian villages, dried cow dung or wood is used as fuel for cooking and heating water. The demand for firewood has increases over a period of time and people are cutting forests everyday to cater their daily needs. This has resulted in reduction of 3 million acres of forest land across the country.

Natural resources are the usable environmental resources of a country that can be segregated in two categories – renewable (air, water, solar radiation, agricultural, crops, etc.), and non-renewable (land, fossil fuels, minerals, etc.). The supply of natural resources in India can be termed as moderate, whereby it is abundant in some resources, but short in others.

 Most significant mineral resources in India are Iron ore, Manganese, Chromite, Bauxite, Titanium ore, Mica, Diamonds, Limestone, Thorium, Gold, Petroleum, and Natural Gas. India has the largest Thorium reserves in the world, along the coast of Kerala and the third largest coalmines spread across some states in eastern and central parts.

India ranks at 12^th place in the terms of natural gas reserves and imports small amounts of the resource. However, with the growing demand of CNG (compressed natural gas) as a more efficient fuel option, discovery of more reserves is critical for attaining self-sufficiency. Most of India’s petroleum reserves (second largest in Asia Pacific) are found in Bombay High, with some newly discovered resources in the Bay of Bengal and Rajasthan. However, currently, only 40% of the domestic demand is met by indigenous oil exploration and India depends heavily on oil imports.