Antam forecasts higher output

Antam forecasts higher output

JAKARTA (Dow Jones): Indonesia's listed nickel and gold miner PT Aneka Tambang expects to raise gold output by between 5% and 10% this year after it managed to bolster it to four tons last year, from 2.7 tons in 1999, the company's president Deddy Aditya Sumanegara said on Wednesday.

He said gold output will continue to rise as disturbances from illegal miners near its gold mining site in Pongkor, West Java, have been abating substantially.

"Now we can work peacefully," Deddy told journalists.

He added the number of illegal miners near its site has fallen to between 100 and 200 people, from around 5,000 during the height of the Asian economic crisis in 1998 and 1999.

Illegal miners several times set ablaze Aneka Tambang's trucks, heavy equipment and buildings in Pongkor in 1998, which prompted the company to temporarily shut down mining on a few occasions in 1998 and 1999.