Chinese firms to build $5b steel industrial park

Posted on June 4, 2014 by Nanthakumar Victor Emmanuel, P.Eng Leave a comment

Several Chinese firms plan to invest up to US$5 billion to develop an industrial park in Bantaeng regency, South Sulawesi, which is slated to become Indonesia’s first integrated iron-and-steel industrial park.

The park will be home to eight smelters that will produce nickel pig iron and ferronickel, ingredients in stainless steel production, according to the Industry Ministry’s director general for manufacturing-based industry Harjanto.

The investors in the smelting plants include China’s major nickel pig iron producer Xinhai Technology and Mex International, which will spend $1 billion and $300 million respectively. Miners such as Beijing 21st Century Resources Investment Co. and Asia Pacific Iron Corporation, will produce iron concentrate and nickel ore in the area.

The park would occupy a site of around 3,000 hectares, equal to 8 percent of the regency’s total area, Harjanto said.

“Economic activities in the park, which is expected to contribute 80 percent to the regency’s gross domestic product, will help raise the per capita income of the local population to around $2,000 from $1,500 at present,” he told reporters at his office.