JAKARTA : Indonesia has cut tax incentives to limit investment in lower quality nickel products as it aims to extract as much value as possible from its rich nickel reserves and push for further downstream investment, a cabinet minister said on Wednesday.
Since banning nickel ore exports in 2020, Indonesia has seen a surge in investment into smelters but most output is ferronickel or nickel pig iron , used in stainless steel, that typically only contains 30 per cent to 40 per cent of nickel. "Downstreaming must at least reach 60 per cent to 70 per cent nickel content in Indonesia and not only for intermediate products," Bahlil said in an interview with Reuters.
He declined to comment on discussions Indonesia is having with companies like U.S. car maker Tesla and China's BYD Group to encourage investment.