Wednesday, 17 June 2015

TO REDUCE ILLEGAL MINING ACTIVITIES, GOVERNMENT TIGHTENS EXPORT OF TIN



The Ministry of Trade is committed to preserve the environment from illegal mining of tin ores. Minister of trade, Rachmat Gobel, in Jakarta, on Wednesday (May 20), said that the government tightened export of tin as an effort to reduce illegal export practices. The policy was set out in the Minister of Trade Regulation No. 33/M-Dag/PER/5/2015 which is an amendment to the previous regulation, i.e. Regulation No.44/M-Dag/PER/7/2014 on export of tin. The mew regulation is effective from August 1 this year.

Rachmat said that the new regulation contains five provisions. First, there are only three kinds of tin products that can be exported, i.e. pure tin bars with Sn 99.9%, tin solder with Sn 99.7%, and other articles of tin with Sn 96%. Second, the Ministry of Trade requires tin ingots to be traded through the country and trade activities in the country.

And, the third is recommendation for registered exporters (ET) of tin bars which was previously issued by the coal governor, is transferred to the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources. Mining Business License (IUP) can only be used to obtain ET recommendation if it has met the clean and clear (CnC) requirement. Fourth, pure tin bars can only be exported if the tin ore raw material is obtained from IUP with CnC status, and it has paid royalty payment. Fifth, export recommendation for ET of tin solder and ET of other articles of tin Is issued by the Ministry of Industry.

Meanwhile, Jabin Sufianto, Chairman of Indonesian Tin Exporters Association (AETI) said that his party is optimistic about the tightening of tin export that may have a positive impact, both to minimize damage to the environment around the mine and the boost the selling price. Unfortunately, according to him, the long period of time, i.e. until August 1, 2015, could provide opportunities for illegal miners to boost export volumes.

AETI projected production of tin bars this year to be down around 8% to 10% compared to the realization in 2014 at 71,151 tons. Jabin said that his party projected this production this year to reach about 65,000 tons. In addition to the drop in prices, changes in policy in Minister of Trade Regulation No.44/2014 also affect the decline in tin exports.

He said that in Minister of Trade Regulation No. 44/2014, the government classifies tin products into four types, namely pure tin bars with stannum (Sn) content at least 99.9%, non-bar pure tin with the lowest Sn content of 99.93%, tin solder with the highest Sn content at 99.7%, and tin alloy non-solder with Sn content maximum 96%. Throughout 2014, Timah posted metal tin ingot production at 27,550 tons. This volume is up 16.15% compared to the previous year’s production volume at 23,718 tons.

It is said that companies who want to export pure tin bars should have registered exporters (ET) of pure tin bars and it should be implemented through a futures exchange. He explained that exports of tin solder and other items made from tin are allowed if they are made of pure tin bars raw materials purchased in the Tin Exchange, an international tin market in Indonesia, which is part of the Future Exchange. Therefore, pure tin bars to be exported or sold domestically must first be traded at the Tin Exchange.

Tin traded at he Tin Exchange must come from a company bearing status as Registered Exporter of Pure Tin Bars. In the previous regulation, the requirement of trade at the Tin Exchange is only applied only to pure tin bars to be exported, whereas those to be traded I domestic market are not subject to such requirement. (E)

Business New - May 22, 2015

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