Mongolia’s total coal exports recovered to its pre-pandemic level at nearly 4 million tonnes (mn t) in August, according to the country’s latest customs data released on September 9.
Notably, the aggregate export volume surged by 55.2% month-on-month in August; although it is still lower by 3.7% year-on-year.
The fast-track implementation, as joint efforts of Mongolia and China since early August, has markedly accelerated Mongolia’s coal export, as reported by the Mongolian government. The measures include unloading coal at a special region with no physical contact required.
The latest measure visibly increased the total number of trucks crossing the Mongolia-China border to 2,001 on August 26.
1,272 among those trucks travelled through Gashuun Sukhait-Ganqimaodu checkpoint, while 570 trucks moved via Shivee Kuren-Ceke checkpoint — the top two Mongolia-China coal exporting conduits.
Contrastingly on July 25, the trucks crossing all checkpoints totaled at a far lower number of 919.
Higher coal deliveries from Mongolia to China, however, led to softening in the Mongolian coal price throughout the month.
The price of Mongolian coal with 11% ash, 25% volatility and 0.7% sulphur declined by CNY 10/t ($1.5/t) m-o-m to CNY 950/t including the 13% VAT as of August 31 with the delivery at the checkpoints.
Over January-August, Mongolia’s total coal exports was still 39.1% lower y-o-y to 15.2 mn t due to lesser volumes exported over February-July amid the pandemic outbreak.
96% of Mongolia’s total coal exports over January-August went into China, according to the customs data.
Earlier in February this year, Mongolia had shut its borders to China. It has reopened since late March, but the coal trucking has been recovering slowly because of the persistent efforts to contain the virus.
As for this month, the customs authorities in Mongolia and China are continuing with efforts to further increase the Mongolian coal delivery.
The Mongolian Customs has extended the border clearance hours at Shivee Kuren-Ceke by two hours to 08:00-20:00 Beijing time starting September 2, enabling an average of 800-900 trucks/day to pass instead of around 600 trucks/day prior to this.
It would however remain a challenge for Mongolia to realize its target of increasing its annual coal exports to over 40 mn t in 2020, from the 36.5 million tonnes in 2019, because of the impact of the pandemic on the volumes transported in the first half of this year.
Note: This news article is published under a data exchange agreement between CoalMint and Mysteel – a China-centric insight and global metal markets intelligence providing company.
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By Aditya Sinha
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