Responding To Trump's Statement On The Republic Of Indonesia Abolishing Export Restrictions, IMA Calls Downstreaming

Coal (photo: dock. intermediate)

JAKARTA - United States President Donald Trump issued a document saying Indonesia would remove a number of export restrictions including critical minerals. This is one of the agreements for the US government to lower the reciprocal rate by 32 percent to 19 percent.

Responding to this, Executive Director of the Indonesian Mining Association (IMA) Hendra Sinadia said his party was still waiting for an explanation from the Indonesian government regarding the plan to export critical minerals.

Hendra assessed that critical mineral exports would be very dangerous for the downstream ecosystem which had started running. According to him, Indonesia has succeeded in downstreaming by banning exports of raw materials.

"If export or not can't be done, there is already an obligation (hilirization)," he said when met in Sarinah, Wednesday, July 23.

He added that the rules for prohibiting the export of raw minerals that have been in effect so far are on the right track to form a downstream ecosystem. For this reason, if the export tap is reopened, the ecosystem that is starting to form is threatened with disassembly.

"The rules of domestic processing obligations, whatever minerals are extracted, must be processed and sent in the form after the added value," he continued.

For this reason, he emphasized that the agreement must be observed further and there needs to be an official announcement from the government regarding the details of the agreement between the United States and the United States.

"We must study it first or maybe wait for an official statement from the government, what is the translation of this agreement to our regulations," he said.