JAKARTA – Indonesia will see its  exports this year to be driven up by its top three commodities, namely crude palm oil, nickel, and coal, analyst said.

Bank Permata Chief Economist Josua Pardede said that the prices of the three commodities had already way surpassed their pre-pandemic levels. The price increase had encouraged producers of the commodities to raise their production.

“Besides, the three commodities were seeing rising demand at global market, especially in China, as global economy was reportedly recovering,” Josua told Kontan.co.id on Thursday, 29 July 2021.

Josua said that the decision of China to stop coal import from Australia will push up Indonesia’s coal export to China to substitute the coal from Australia.

He pointed out that the prices of the three commodities had increased significantly this year. “As of 28 July 2021, the price of nickel rose by 17.6% compared to that at the end of 2020 or year to date (ytd). The price of CPO rose by 12% (ytd), and coal price shot up by 86.6% (ytd).

According to him, the three commodities are potential to see price reduction in the future as their current prices have been relatively high. “But compared to their average prices during 2020, their average prices in 2021 are very much higher, so that their total export values will highly increase in 2021,” he said.

He said that Indonesia’s main export destinations, such as China and the USA, are seeing an economic recovery that has been pushing demand.

Josua projected that the growth of Indonesia’s exports during the second quarter 2021 would reach 12.5% year on year (yoy) and during the whole year of 2021 will be 22.9% yoy. (*)

Source: KONTAN.CO.ID