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.