Indonesia TURNs Out To Be A Country With The 6th Largest Bauxite Reserve In The World

Illustration (Photo: Doc. Antara)

JAKARTA - President of the Republic of Indonesia Joko Widodo (Jokowi) announced that Indonesia will stop exporting bauxite ore starting June 2023 to encourage the domestic processing industry.

Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs, Airlangga Hartarto, revealed that Indonesia's bauxite resilience is still sufficient for the next 90 to 100 years.

"Our bauxite reserves are 3.2 billion tons," said Airlangga, quoted on Thursday, December 22.

Based on data from the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources, at least Indonesia's bauxite reserves are currently 4 percent of the world's total reserves.

Meanwhile, Indonesia's bauxite production was recorded at 4.3 percent of total world production and placed Indonesia with the largest number 6 bauxite reserves in the world, after Guinea, Australia, Vietnam, Brazil, and Jamaica.

Regarding industrial readiness, he continued, Indonesia already has four bauxite purification facilities that are in accordance with Alumina's capacity of 4.3 million tons.

Purification of bauxite itself is in the development stage with an input capacity of 27.41 million tons and a production capacity of 4.98 million tons.

"Our bauxite reserves are large at 3.2 billion tons and this can meet a capacity of 41.5 million tons, so from the number of smelters prepared, the 8 can still be 12 other smelters," said Airlangga.

Later, he continued, the bauxite product will be processed and entered into alumina and then processed into aluminum mellum refining aluminum drinking ingot.

"And from there it goes down to its derivatives in the form of bars or flats. Of course it will go down again to industries that already have an ecosystem, namely machinery and construction," he explained.

Airlangga added that the policy to stop the export of bauxite has allowed the government to save the country's foreign exchange of up to 2 billion US dollars.

"Devisa savings of US$2 billion from exports are also estimated to reach a significant value of around Rp. 62 trillion," Airlangga concluded.