Indonesia Seeks to Increase Coal Shipments to India, China

(Bloomberg) -- Indonesia, Asia’s biggest coal exporter, seeks to increase shipments to India and China as the economies improve and consumption rises. “We’ll see demand from India increase as their power plants start operating,” Herlan Siagian, general manager for marketing at PT Bumi Resources, Indonesia’s biggest coal producer, said on the sidelines of a McCloskey Group Ltd. industry conference in Bali.Chinese coal imports may exceed 100 million metric tons this year and rise to 200 million tons annually over the next several years, JPMorgan said in a report on Nov. 13. Coal imports by India may increase to 81 million tons in the year ending March 2012 from 70 million tons in the year ending March 2010, Indian coal minister Sriprakash Jaiswal said last month.

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Indonesia to Draw Up Rules for Domestic Coal Supplies in 2010
(Bloomberg) -- Indonesia, the world’s biggest exporter of coal used by power plants, may draw up rules next year requiring companies to set aside part of their output for domestic needs, an official at the energy ministry said.The Southeast Asian country also plans to issue a ministry regulation to set a price benchmark for coal miners when paying non-income tax payments such as royalty and other duties, Bambang Gatot Ariyono, a director for coal and minerals at the ministry, said after attending a McCloskey Group Ltd. conference in Bali today.The regulations on domestic market obligations and the price benchmark “will be issued after four mining-related government regulations are released” around January, Ariyono said.

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