Mining, oil revenues fell in Q3
Copyright 2000, The National (PNG)
December 27, 2000
By BREMEBIL KUBLE and ZACHERY PER
PAPUA New Guinea's overall mining and oil export revenues fell to K971 million in the September quarter, compared with K1,067.6 million in the same period last year, despite a 6.2 per cent increase to K440 million in oil revenues.
In its quarterly economic bulletin, the Bank of Papua New Guinea said the decline was mainly due to falling prices for gold and copper.
This had more than offset the 55.6 per cent increase from K54 in the same quarter last year to an average of K84 per barrel of oil during the latest September quarter.
The big increase in oil prices - these have been falling in recent weeks - managed to offset a 32.3 per cent plunge in crude oil exports, which fell to 5,239,300 barrels from 7,735,100 barrels in the same quarter last year.
Mineral export receipts, excluding crude oil, declined by 18.8 per cent to K530.1 million during the quarter compared with 652.6 million barrels in the September quarter last year.
Gold exports dropped by 8.6 per cent to 16.9 tonnes during the quarter, from 18.5 tonnes previously, because of lower production from the Lihir, Ok Tedi and Tolukuma mines.
These cuts were greater than increased output at the Porgera and Misima mines, BPNG said.
It added: "The decline at the Lihir gold mine was due to the temporary closure of the mine for equipment repairs combined with the mining of lower ore grades, while the decrease at the Ok Tedi mine was due to the delay in shipments as a result of maintenance work at the major smelters in Europe.
"The average FOB price received for Papua New Guinea's gold exports was K24.3 million per tonne during the September quarter of 2000, 7.6 per cent lower than K26.3 million per tonne in the corresponding quarter of 1999."
The central bank said this was due to realisation of lower hedged prices as well as appreciation of the kina against the US dollar.
In US dollar terms, the average gold price had actually increased by 8.2 per cent to US$278 an ounce during the quarter.
As a result gold export revenues dropped by 15.4 per cent to K411.3 million compared with K46.4 million in the September quarter last year.
Due to the mining of lower grades and fewer shipments, copper export volumes plunged by 35.1 per cent to 24,000 tonnes during the quarter, compared with 37,000 tonnes in the same period last year.
This was an unfortunate development for the economy since average PNG copper export prices rose by 9.4 per cent to K4,742 per tonne. In spite of this, copper export receipts plunged by 2.1 per cent to K113.8 million from K160.4 million previously.