In an effort to secure access for coal exports to China amid a potential slump in domestic production, the Indonesian Coal Mining Association (APBI) signed on Friday a memorandum of agreement (MoU) with the China National Coal Association (CNCA) to support further trade and investment flow between the two countries.

APBI chairman Pandu Sjahrir said the association was the first to sign such an MoU among the CNCA's other foreign counterparts.

“There are so many things we have done at the business-to-business level [with the CNCA], but we want to strengthen our policy perspectives, especially regarding energy security in the two countries,” Pandu told reporters in Jakarta.

China is the world’s largest coal consumer and the largest buyer of Indonesia’s coal. In 2018, it imported 125 million metric tons of mostly low-calorie coal from Indonesia, absorbing 25 percent of Indonesia’s coal exports.

As the world’s second-largest coal producer after Australia, Indonesian coal comprised 45 percent of China’s coal imports in 2018. That same year, China also produced over 3 billion metric tons of coal.

Coal, most of which is converted into electricity, forms a crucial part of the countries’ energy security plans.

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