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T Freeport Indonesia, the Indonesian unit of US mining firm Freeport McMoran Copper & Gold Inc., reported that it has paid US$678 million to the government in financial obligations for its first-quarter operations.

The payment was comprised of $346 million in corporate income tax; $165 million in employee income tax, regional tax and other levies; $51 million in royalties. The remaining$117 million was the government’s share of dividends.

The first-quarter payment brought the total payments made by Freeport during its operations from 1992 to March 2011 to $12.1 billion, comprised of $7.3 billion in corporate income tax, $2.3 billion in employee income tax, regional tax and other levies, $1.2 in royalties and $1.2 billion in dividends.

For the full year of 2010 the company’s financial obligations to the government reached $1.9 billion, comprised of $1.2 billion in corporate income tax; $308 million in employee income tax, regional tax and other taxes; $185 million in royalties and $169 million in dividends.

The company’s annual contributions to the government, according to a 2010 study conducted by the University of Indonesia’s Institute of Economic and Social Research, were estimated at 1.59 percent of GDP.

The company, which operates the Grasberg copper and gold mine in Papua, also made other contributions to the government, such as infrastructure investment for the province, and contributed 1.59 percent to GDP.

Earlier on May 5, another gold and copper producer PT Newmont Nusa Tenggara (NNT) announced that it had paid Rp 1.36 trillion to the Indonesian government in the first quarter of 2011 to fulfill its financial obligations for tax, non-tax and royalty payments. (drs)