Asahan Aluminum's output may fall
Asahan Aluminum's output may fall
SINGAPORE: PT Indonesia Asahan Aluminum's primary aluminum output is likely to fall 18 percent on year to 160,000 metric tons in the fiscal year ending March 2003, as the company's power supply has been inadequate, a company official said Wednesday.
The company is the sole primary aluminum producer in Southeast Asia, with an annual capacity of 225,000 tons. The smelter is located in Medan, North Sumatra.
Its power supply comes from a hydroelectric power plant near Lake Toba. But with low levels of water in the lake, the power plant can't generate enough electricity for the smelter to run at full capacity.
"There's no rain at all here," the official said.
In the fiscal year ended March 2002, the company's output fell to 192,000 tons, from 205,192 tons in the previous fiscal year.
The company exports 60 percent of its output to Japan and sells the rest in Indonesia.
PT Indonesia Asahan Aluminum is 60 percent owned by a consortium of Japanese investors, and the Indonesian government owns the remaining stake in the company. -- Dow Jones
;Agencies; ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief-Unilever Unilever to invest $500m in RI JP/14/Brief
Unilever to invest $500m in RI
JAKARTA: PT Unilever Indonesia plans to invest an estimated US$500 million in the next 10 years in Indonesia, an official with its parent company said Wednesday.
Niall Fitzgerald, the global chairman of Unilever Plc., said after a meeting with President Megawati Soekarnoputri that Indonesia is designated by Unilever as a sourcing country for consumer products sold in countries of the Association of the South East Asian Nations.
Unilever Indonesia has been operating locally since 1993 and has invested $250 million in the last decade.
Many foreign companies have pulled out from Indonesia or stopped new investments following the 1997 Asian financial crisis, which sparked political crisis and social unrest in the country. -- Dow Jones
;Agencies; ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief-vehicle-RI RI new vehicle sales down 0.8% JP/14/Brief
RI new vehicle sales down 0.8%
JAKARTA: New vehicle sales in Indonesia fell 0.8 percent on month to 26,892 units in July, car assemblers' association Gaikindo said Wednesday.
The country's largest vehicle maker PT Astra International - which has a joint venture with Toyota Motor Corp. to assemble and distribute the Japanese company's vehicles in Indonesia - saw a 6.1 percent rise in sales to 11,328 units from 10,667 in June, Gaikindo said.
Commercial vehicles accounted for 24,295 units of total sales in July, down 2.9 percent from 25,044 in June.
Passenger car sales - a barometer of consumer confidence - were higher at 2,597 units, compared with 2,074 in June.
So far this year, Indonesian consumers have bought 185,794 new vehicles, the association said. -- Dow Jones
;Agencies; ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief-SIA SIA pilots threaten action JP/14/Brief
SIA pilots threaten action
SINGAPORE: Singapore Airlines said Wednesday it was negotiating with its pilots to avert threatened industrial action due to a dispute over taking in-flight rests in economy class seats.
"We have been having talks with them but have not found a mutually acceptable solution so far," Singapore Airlines spokesman Rick Clements said. "We will continue to try to come up with a solution."
The Straits Times said the Ministry of Manpower was mediating the dispute.
Any industrial action would be the first in 20 years for Singapore Airlines, one of Asia's most prestigious carriers.
In 1980, it took the personal intervention of then prime minister Lee Kuan Yew to end a work slowdown over salaries and benefits. -- AFP