Yanzhou Coal Mining Co Ltd, China's third largest coal producer by market value, has said that it had no plans to raise exports next year due to strong domestic demand.
Coal exports from China, the world's largest producer and consumer of coal, rose 5% in the first seven months of this year from a year earlier, as Chinese producers took advantages of the gap between low domestic prices and strong overseas markets.
Exports fell by nearly a third in July from the previous year and market analysts anticipate that they will continue to fall as Beijing has asked coal producers to cut exports. It has imposed a 10% export tax on thermal coal in a bid to help ease the country's worst power crisis since 2004.
According to chief financial officer Wu Yuxiang, Yanzhou plans to cut dramatically its own exports to 500,000t of coal this year from 1.7 mt last year and will not increase exports in 2009.
"We will not raise exports next year even if export prices keep rising, since we cannot even satisfy domestic demand," he said.
