Hanco to reconditions BA's spare parts
JAKARTA (JP): State coal mining company PT Tambang Batubara Bukit Asam signed a memorandum of understanding yesterday with local company PT Hanco Foundry Industry to recondition spare parts from its mining facilities.
The memorandum was signed by Bukit Asam's president RA Sunardi and Hanco's president Krishnadi Soemali with witnesses including Minister of Mines and Energy I.B. Sudjana, and the ministry's top officials.
Krishnadi said that under the memorandum, Hanco would recondition Bukit Asam's scrapped spare parts and sell them back to the company for 50 percent cheaper than imported parts would cost.
Bukit Asam, which is based in South Sumatra, is one of the country's largest coal mining companies with a production of about 12 million tons per year.
Hanco, which started operation in 1989, produces alloy steel and high resistance castings for mining, oil and gas, cement, plantation, forestry and railway industries at its manufacturing plant in Bandung, West Java.
"Bukit Asam saves a lot of money and we also save a lot of money to buy cheap raw materials for our products," Krishnadi said on the sidelines of the signing ceremony.
Sudjana praised the memorandum, saying that aside from saving Bukit Asam a lot of money amid the monetary crisis, the memorandum would also help develop local manufacturers.
"The cooperation between PT Bukit Asam and Hanco Foundry Industry is thus a real and bold venture to increase the use of locally made products instead imported products as well as to develop local technology," Sudjana said in his speech during the signing ceremony.
He said Bukit Asam had so far imported most of its spare parts for its machinery.
But the current economic crisis, which has led to an increase of between 300 percent and 400 percent in the prices of imported spare parts, has made it difficult for the company to continue importing spare parts.
According to Bukit Asam's president, RA Sunardi, the company imported US$7 million worth of spare parts last year. (jsk)