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Copper export ban comes too early, mining firms warn
A plan to ban the export of copper concentrate starting June has sparked concern among businesses over the readiness of domestic industries to absorb the product.
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Workers walk past a steel structure at the construction site for the PT Freeport Indonesia smelter in Gresik, East Java, on Jan., 13, 2023. (JP/M. Taufiqurrahman)
A
plan to ban the export of copper concentrate starting in June has sparked concern among businesses over the readiness of domestic industries to absorb the product.
Indonesia is one of the world’s top exporters of copper concentrate, a partially processed copper ore that requires further work to increase its purity.
From January to November last year, the country shipped out 2.8 million tonnes of the commodity worth US$8.4 billion.
In a bid to push domestic processing of the commodity, such as smelting, and thereby add value to exports, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo announced the copper concentrate export ban on Jan. 10.
The move is part of the government’s wider strategy to move up the commodity value chain by refining minerals in the country rather than exporting them as ore.
The policy is based on the 2020 Mining Law, which mandates a ban on the export of several mining commodities three years after its issuance to push downstream industrial development in commodity-rich Indonesia.
Djoko Widajatno, executive director of the Indonesia Mining Association (IMA), estimates that the ban would result in an excess of around 1 million tonnes of copper cathodes, given that Indonesia currently only has one copper cathode smelter
