Govt may ease regulation on ore export ban

The government may ease regulation on mineral ore export ban as most mining companies face difficulties to build their smelting plants within the deadline, Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Jero Wacik has said .

The minister acknowledges that under the new mining law, mining companies should operate their own smelting plants or cooperate with smelting companies to process their mineral ores beginning 2014. Starting 2014, export of unprocessed ores will be also totally banned, Kompas reported on Thursday.

He said, however, miners mostly faced difficulties to build the plants as required due to many factors such as land problem and lack of power supply. The construction of a smelting plant takes time. ?It requires research, technology, funding, infrastructure, port and power supply,? he said.

For this reason, Jero said, the government was considering to extend the deadline so that that they would have longer time to construct the smelting plants. For miners which have showed serious preparation would, for example, be still allowed to export unprocessed ores, albeit with higher export tax, the minister said.

The number of smelting plants which have been proposed for construction since the issuance of the new mining law has reached 254 units. But only 11 of them are now ready for construction.

According to data provided by the energy and mineral resources ministry, there are seven smelting plants which have begun operation.

Deputy Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Susilo Siswautomo said that miners faced difficulties to meet the target to start the operation of their smelting plants next year. ?We hope the construction of the smelting plants could be started within the next three years,? he added. (*)