Stop Exports Of Mining Raw Materials To Produce Results, Jokowi Asks Bauxite, Copper, Tin To Follow

President Joko Widodo (DOK BEI)

JAKARTA - President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) said the government's courage to stop the export of mining raw materials had a positive impact on the trade balance. Jokowi asked for the policy to be continued.

"Our courage to stop it (export of nickel ore raw materials) the results are visible. Therefore we continue to stop bauxite, copper, tin, and others," said Jokowi when opening the 2022 Indonesia Stock Exchange Trading in Jakarta, Antara, Monday, January 3rd.

Indonesia has obtained a trade balance surplus for 19 consecutive months. Referring to data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), Indonesia's trade balance since January 2021-November 2021, a surplus of 34 billion US dollars.

Then, continued Jokowi, the value of Indonesia's exports rose 49.7 percent on an annual basis (year on year / yoy) as of November 2021, and imports, including auxiliary raw materials, also rose 52.6 percent.

"Why do our exports increase? One of the reasons is that we stopped exporting raw materials, the raw material for our coal mineral, namely nickel. What I see is 1-2 billion US dollars at the end of the year, yesterday it was almost 21 billion, or 20.8 billion US dollars, "explained Jokowi.

Jokowi emphasized that industrial downstreaming would be the key to increasing Indonesia's exports. In line with this, the competitiveness of the Indonesian economy has also increased.

“And if we look at our competitiveness ranking, we have also increased by three places. In a very difficult position in 2021, we are able to climb these 3 ranks, we should also be grateful, "said the President.

The government has imposed a ban on nickel ore exports since January 1, 2020, as stated in the Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Regulation Number 11 of 2019 concerning the Second Amendment to the Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Number 25 of 2018 concerning Mineral and Coal Mining Concessions.

If nickel ore is processed into downstream products such as ferronickel, the added value of the commodity can reach 14 times, and if it becomes stainless steel billets it can reach 19 times.

The government plans to continue the policy of stopping the export of mining raw materials for bauxite in 2022, and then copper, and others.