Indonesia Announces Export Ban on Raw Ore JAKARTA, Indonesia - Indonesia, one of the world's biggest producers of minerals including gold, nickel, copper, tin and thermal coal, implemented a controversial new law on Sunday banning the export of unprocessed ore. Government officials have said the ban is aimed at increasing value-added industries in Indonesia's economy by requiring miners to build smelters in the country, but the policy has been roundly criticized by both foreign and domestic companies as short-sighted and nationalistic. Some say it is driven by political motives ahead of legislative and presidential elections this year. "Starting at midnight on Jan. 12, 2014, raw ore definitely cannot be exported," Jero Wacik, the minister of energy and mineral resources, told reporters late Saturday after a meeting led by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. However, Mr. Yudhoyono issued an 11th-hour regulation that could ease the ban's impact on major mining companies, including the United States giants Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold and Newmont Mining Corporation, Teuku Faizasyah, a presidential spokesman, said Sunday. He referred requests for further comment to the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources and the office of Hatta Rajasa, Indonesia's coordinating minister for economic affairs. Details of the presidential regulation have not been released, but mining companies will reportedly be obligated to build smelting facilities by 2017. Those companies, however, say doing so is not economically viable. Not only Freeport and Newmont, but we have 66 companies that have said they will build smelters. These will get a chance to export processed minerals," Mr. Wacik said, according to the Reuters news agency. The energy ministry will later give more details on the levels of concentrate allowed. Indonesia produces more than 15 percent of the global nickel supply and 3 percent of the global copper supply, according to various estimates.