Indonesia closes 1,000 illegal tin mines, removing 80% of Bangka-Belitung output from global supply

In late 2025, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto announced a sweeping crackdown on illegal mining in the Bangka-Belitung Islands province — the archipelago that has supplied the world with tin for over a century. The government ordered the closure of approximately 1,000 illegal mining operations, a move that industry analysts estimate has removed up to 80% of Bangka-Belitung's informal tin output from global supply chains. (FACT: MINING.COM, October 2025; Crux Investor, 2025; Trading Economics, February 2026)

The scale of the disruption is difficult to overstate. Indonesia is the world's largest exporter of refined tin and the second-largest producer globally after China. Bangka-Belitung alone accounts for the vast majority of the country's tin production. The informal sector — comprising thousands of small-scale, unlicensed miners operating on land and offshore — has historically contributed a significant share of Indonesia's total tin output, though exact figures are inherently opaque. Government estimates suggest the country was losing approximately US$1.2 billion annually to illegal tin mining, with losses projected to reach US$2.6 billion by 2026 without intervention. (FACT: Crux Investor, 2025; MINING.COM, October 2025)

The market reaction was immediate. LME three-month tin surged above US$37,500/t in early October 2025, its highest level since April of that year, when disruption at the Bisie mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo had spooked the market. More tellingly, the crackdown flipped LME time spreads into backwardation: just two weeks before the announcement, LME cash tin had traded at a wide US$167/t discount to the three-month contract. After the news, it flipped to a US$105/t premium, as shorts scrambled to cover positions and physical buyers priced in tighter availability. (FACT: MINING.COM — Column, October 2025; Crux Investor, 2025)

Indonesia's refined tin exports had already been in decline. According to ITA data cited by Reuters, refined tin shipments fell 33% in 2024 to just 46,000 tonnes, while mine production dropped 28% due to both general mining quota restrictions and specific regulatory focus on the tin sector. The trend continued into 2025, with the crackdown further compressing supply. By January 2026, Indonesia's refined tin exports "virtually evaporated," with the country shipping just 400 tonnes abroad — all in the form of solder — the lowest monthly figure since August 2015, when an earlier export regime was implemented to exclude illegally mined metal. (FACT: Reuters, January 2025; Tendata, 2025; Reuters, January 2026)

Export licensing chaos compounded the production losses. A change in Indonesia's export permit system created additional bottlenecks in early 2026, as exporters struggled to navigate new documentation requirements. The seasonal cycle of RKAB (Rencana Kerja dan Anggaran Biaya — Work Plan and Budget) mining and smelting licence renewals added further delays. The International Tin Association noted that while regulators had committed to honouring existing three-year RKAB licences until end of March 2026, the transition period created significant uncertainty for market participants. (FACT: ITA, January 2026; Tendata, 2025)

There is, however, a potential offset. The Indonesia Tin Exporters Association has indicated that official production quotas are expected to rise from 53,000 tonnes in 2025 to 60,000 tonnes in 2026, as legitimate operations expand to capture market share lost by the informal sector. This implies that some — but not all — of the illegal output can be replaced by formal-sector production. However, the transition from informal to formal mining is neither quick nor easy: illegal miners lack the capital, equipment, and permitting to scale up rapidly, and many operate on land where formal title is contested. (FACT: Reuters, January 2026; BMI/Fitch Solutions, 2026)

Broader resource nationalism is also reshaping Indonesia's tin policy. Jakarta has implemented a 2025 ban on the export of unprocessed tin, forcing foreign buyers to source refined metal or semi-processed products rather than raw concentrate. This policy, part of President Prabowo's broader agenda to capture more downstream value from the country's mineral wealth, has tightened global feedstock supply and supported higher refined tin prices. It aligns with similar policies in nickel and bauxite, where Indonesia has used export restrictions to encourage domestic processing capacity. (FACT: aInvest, 2025; BMI/Fitch Solutions, MINING.COM)

The crackdown's impact on global supply chains was summarised succinctly by MINING.COM's Andy Home: "The price reaction to the Indonesian news says much about the fragility of the tin supply chain, which is beholden to a small number of big producers." With the Bangka-Belitung informal sector largely shut down, Man Maw still stalled in Myanmar, and the DRC's Bisie mine operating as the only major Western-friendly source of tin concentrate, the global tin market is more concentrated — and therefore more vulnerable — than at any point in recent history. (FACT: MINING.COM — Column, October 2025)