Aussie coal exports surge

Aussie coal exports surge

SYDNEY (Reuter): The Australian coal industry could increase exports by as much as 50 percent to A$12 billion a year with workplace reform, Leigh Clifford, energy chief executive for Rio Tinto Ltd, said yesterday.

This might take Australia 10 or so years, but the opportunity was there with reform, Clifford said.

Clifford, delivering a strong message for the need for reform of work practices in the coal industry, held out the threat of Indonesia as a major competitor in Asian markets.

"In five years or so, we will see Indonesia becoming the world's third largest coal exporter and the second largest supplier to the Asian market," Clifford said.

Indonesian coal was cheap to produce, closer to customers and the market was becoming increasingly familiar with it, Clifford said.

Clifford's message, delivered at an international coal conference in Sydney, came as Rio Tinto's 71 percent-owned Coal and Allied Industries Ltd faces a stand-off with unionized miners at its Hunter Valley No 1 mine.