The Indonesia government has warned the mining and smelting companies, specially those posing a threat to country’ plan to develop its downstream mining industry, to comply with the price floor regulations and the nickel ore export ban.
Price floor for nickel ore prices has been specified in the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministerial Regulation No. 11/2020, Mineral Benchmark Prices (HPM), said the Office of the Coordinating Maritime Affairs and Investment Minister’s undersecretary of mining, Septian Hario Seto on July 23.
The government learned about the violators of the regulations, wherein members preferred to internally fix prices through business deals. Local nickel miners sold nickel ore at $27/wmt in June, lower than that month’s price floor of $28.93/wmt and even lower than the international price of $70/wmt.
Indonesia had imposed ban on nickel exports in January, 2020 following President Joko Widodo’s plan to promote domestic processing of minerals.
Moreover, Indonesia has paved way to the next stage of nickel processing with an aim to produce its own lithium batteries by 2023. The move is a part of a strategic plan to lower the its deficit by pushing exports of more value-added goods instead of raw materials.