Foreign media news on July 10: Indonesian mining minister said on Friday that Indonesian officials are investigating whether there is illegal export of nickel ore to China. Since the beginning of 2020, Indonesia has banned the export of nickel ore for more than three years. This move aims to develop Indonesia's domestic downstream industry and enhance the value of the industrial chain. Indonesian government officials said the policy would boost exports of nickel products from $1 billion in 2015 to more than $30 billion by 2022.
However, Chinese customs data show that despite the Indonesian ban, China is still importing nickel ore from Indonesia. Imports for the period 2020-May 2023 are 5.56 million tonnes. China is the world's largest nickel consumer.
Indonesian Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Arifin? Tasreef said Indonesia's customs and mining ministries were investigating possible illegal ore exports. He added that we are collecting data and verifying that the export is required, so how did the nickel ore get out? He said investigators were looking into discrepancies in product classifications reported by exporters and other potential causes.
Analysts and traders believe that the reason for this difference may be related to the different definitions of products by the customs of the two countries. Indonesia may register exports as iron ore, but China registers imports as nickel ore. Nickel ores are usually high in iron.
Data from Statistics Indonesia show that from 2020 to 2022, Indonesia will export less than 2 tons of nickel ore. For comparison, 32 million tons were exported in 2019 alone.