The Indonesian government has decided to immediately build 14 coal export seaports in Sumatra and Kalimantan to keep track of coal exports. During his opening speech at the 20th Coal-trans Asia Coal Industry Conference, the country’s Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry’s Director General of Minerals and Coal, Dr R. Sukhyar, said that the 14 harbours would also help to control illegal coal exports. Mr Sukhyar acknowledged that there were still discrepancies in data on coal exports at his ministry and the Directorate General of Customs and Excise, as a result of which the value of royalty obtained by the state was not very optimal. Now, seven ports will be built and developed in Kalimantan and seven in Sumatra and all of them will be based in the locations of coal mining industries and regions.
Mr Sukhyar added that the development of coal export ports would make use of the already existing infrastructure so that the cost of the construction of 14 new ports can be reduced. The plan is part of a cooperation project between the Ministry of Transportation and the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources, while the very implementation will be supervised by the former. It is hoped that the new coal ports will manage to balance domestic needs and exports as only Indonesia’s domestic need of coal for this year is estimated to be up to 95.5 million tonnes compared to the last year’s mere 65 million tonnes. According to Mr Sukhyar, the increasing domestic demand can still be attained as the target of national coal production for 2014 has been set at 390-420 million tonnes.
