Faisal Basri Bluntly Calls Indonesia 'Stubborn' To Lose Hundreds Of Trillions Because Of Still Exporting Nickel Ore To China Even Though It Is Banned

Indef's senior economist, Faisal Basri. (Photo: Doc. Antara)

JAKARTA - University of Indonesia (UI) senior economist Faisal Basri said Indonesia had suffered heavy losses in the mining sector. In fact, according to him, the number reaches hundreds of trillions of rupiah. This happens because exports of raw nickel ore or ore are still happening even though the government has banned it, one of which is to China.

In 2020, said Faisal, based on data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), there were no exports with the HS2604 code for nickel ore or concentrate. However, General Customs of China noted that in 2020 there were 3.4 million tons of imports from Indonesia.

Faisal said the export volume of nickel ore last year even exceeded the trade record in 2014. Based on data from the General Customs Administration of China, the transaction value of nickel exports last year exceeded 193.6 million US dollars.

According to Faisal, in the calculation of Jisdor's exchange rate, assuming an exchange rate of Rp14,577, the value of Indonesia's nickel exports to China last year reached Rp2.8 trillion as of December 31. Because of this, Faisal said that in the last five years the value of state losses has continued to increase.

"In the last five years, the state has lost hundreds of trillions of rupiah. It's already 2.8 (one year) already," he said in a virtual discussion, Tuesday, October 12.

Faisal said Indonesia could anticipate the emergence of potential losses in various ways. One of them is calculating the smelter production and normal needs.

"Well, what's the mechanism if the government has an intention, it's actually easy to track it down. So just count how many smelters are produced, then what is the normal need, does he buy more or not, he buys it for the production process or maybe some of it is sold outside, even though it's not allowed, Just ride, ride," he said.

As is known, the government has banned the export of nickel ore as of January 2, 2021. This provision is contained in the Regulation of the Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Number 11 of 2019 concerning the ban on exports of nickel ore.

The ban on nickel ore exports was met with resistance from domestic businessmen and international trading partners. In fact, the European Union had filed a lawsuit and complained about the policies of the Government of Indonesia to the World Trade Organization or WTO.