Bauxite Miners Highlight Governance Challenges Amidst Industry Optimism

The Chairman of the Indonesian Bauxite Association, Ronald Sulistyanto, is optimistic about the prospects for developing the national bauxite downstream industry, driven by increasing global demand for alumina and aluminium. Despite this optimism, he acknowledged that investment in bauxite downstreaming still faces significant challenges, including licensing hurdles, frequently changing regulations, and the critical need to strengthen industrial governance from upstream to downstream. A key issue in the upstream sector is that miners are struggling to obtain good selling prices for bauxite ore, as production is abundant while demand from smelters remains limited. Consequently, business players are hoping for improvements in ecosystem governance, including a resolution to the ore pricing issue.