description of operations utah's activities consist of three basic types of operation construction land development and mining the company's origin over 61 years ago was in construction and its entry into mining and land development was a nat ural outgrowth of this experience mining has become the largest contributor to profit the objective for mining is to emphasize the extraction of basic raw materials from deposits where adequate profit margins and return on investment can be obtained pref erably by low-cost strip mining whereby large-scale earth-moving techniques learned by your company in its many years of expe rience in construction can be utilized the minerals mined are iron ore coal uranium and copper iron ore your company mines its domestic iron ore at the iron springs mine near cedar city utah the output of which is contracted for by the columbia-geneva division of united states steel corporation during the year your company built and brought into operation an iron ore beneficiation plant at , the iron springs mine this plant will permit i better utilization of the ore reserves the section of dowi reclaim tunnel san nicolas marcona's iron ore shipments of 4.23b.000 ions would fill a freight train 450 miles long stated differently this iron would produce all the steel going into 4,000,000 compact automobiles over twice the number manu factured in the united states last year company continues its contract mining oper ations in the cedar city district through its 50 voting and a\va equity in marcona mining company operating in peru your company has a substantial interest in the international iron ore market marcona had an excellent year and earned the highest profit in its history and your company's equity in the earnings of marcona for the 12 months ended october 31 1961 after making allowances for taxes on distribution is 2,771,109 construction is well along on the beneficiation plant and other facilities in connection with the program to expand pro duction at marcona this upgrading and expansion program has now been increased from 22,000,000 to 42,000,000 and will make possible marketing of premium prod ucts during the year ending october 31 1961 4,238,000 tons of marcona iron ore were shipped to markets in north and south america europe and japan this is the larg est volume that has ever been shipped by marcona moreover current plans call for even larger shipments in the future coal a new coal mine is being opened by utah at the four corners section of new mexico near farmington your company