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tate-owned diversified miner PT Aneka Tambang (Antam) and PT Newmont Nusa Tenggara (NNT) are in discussions over a possible partnership to abide by the government'€™s regulation of mandatory mineral processing.

Antam corporate secretary Tri Hartono said the partnership would likely be in the form of concentrate supply.

'€œWe won'€™t talk about a cooperation on building a smelter with NNT,'€ he said on Friday.

'€œAt the moment, we are in the process of negotiating the sale and purchase agreement [SPA].'€

NNT president director Martiono Hadianto could not be reached for comment over the planned cooperation.

NNT'€™s move follows the government'€™s implementation of the 2009 Mining Law, which requires all mining companies to process and refine their ores domestically before they export their products, in 2014.

Raw mineral exports have been totally banned since Jan. 12.

Despite the full ban, the government has exempted mining companies producing half-processed products, such as concentrate, to continue exporting the goods until 2017.

The government, however, has put in place a progressive export duty scheme as disincentives for those miners, so as to force them to build smelters and refineries in the country.

The government has also asked miners producing end-products to obtain recommendations stating that they have met the minimum requirement of mineral content in their products and commitment to processing and refining ores domestically from the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry before they can apply for export permits at the Trade Ministry.

The Trade Ministry announced on Thursday that it had granted
permits for nine mining companies, including Antam.

For producers of semi-finished minerals, such as PT Freeport Indonesia and NNT, neither has the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry nor the Trade Ministry has granted recommendations or permits to allow the two US mining giants to resume their shipments overseas.

NNT and Freeport have been arguing that the government could not impose any additional duties, which are not stipulated in their contracts of work.

The Finance Ministry has said that the duties are aimed at forcing mining companies to process and refine their minerals into end products with higher price and value so that the country will benefit more from mining activities.

Jakarta-listed Antam recently signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with copper miner Freeport Indonesia, a subsidiary of US-based Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc., regarding a joint feasibility study for the construction of a copper smelter.

The smelter is designed to have a production capacity of 300,000 tons of copper cathode and is estimated to cost US$2.2 billion.

Antam, which will be affected by the export ban, as about a third of its revenues used to come from the selling of nickel ore, said that the cooperation would also benefit the firm'€™s expansion plan for its anode slime processing facility.

Antam president director Tato Miraza has said that his company is working to expand the capacity of its anode slime processing facility in East Jakarta.

He said Antam planned to add 2,000 tons to its anode slime facility'€™s existing capacity.

'€œWe will work on the first phase, [increasing the capacity by] 500 tons with investment of around $1 million, and in the second stage to add another 1,500 tons, with around $3 million to be spent,'€ he said.

'€œWe have started the works and have purchased the needed equipment.'€