From the pit to the point of hand-over, moving mineral and coal in Indonesia is a governed activity. The rulebook defines hauling and selling as stages of the mining business, gives a production-operation permit holder the choice of doing that work itself or handing it to a licensed transport-and-sales company, treats the mine haul road and the port or processing plant that may sit outside the licensed area as permitted infrastructure, and requires the volume that leaves the site to reconcile against the royalty paid on it.
This explainer sets out how the framework works for a foreign investor: where the rules sit, why transport and sale are licensed rather than incidental, who may hold the transport-and-sales licence and on what evidence, how the haul road and off-site facilities are permitted, what conditions attach to selling domestic and export cargo, and the supervision layer Indonesia added in June 2026. Every article and date below is taken from the two primary texts read directly from the legal database of the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (JDIH ESDM).
Where the rules sit
| Instrument | Date | Its role here |
|---|---|---|
| Government Regulation (PP) No. 96 of 2021 on the Implementation of Mineral and Coal Mining Business | 9 September 2021 (State Gazette 2021 No. 208) | the framework: it defines transport and sale as mining business activities, creates the Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan (transport-and-sales licence), sets the mining-road rules, and imposes the domestic-priority and benchmark-price conditions on selling |
| Ministerial Decree (Kepmen) ESDM No. 229.K/MB.01/MEM.B/2026 on Stepping Up Supervision of the Transport and/or Sale of Mineral and/or Coal Commodities | 3 June 2026 | the supervision layer: surveyor verification through the Sales Verification Module, reconciliation of sales reports against the royalty paid, and physical inspection of export cargo |
Status matters. The state's legal database records PP 96/2021 as amended twice — by PP No. 25 of 2024 and again by PP No. 39 of 2025 as the second amendment. This article is written from the text of PP 96/2021 held on JDIH ESDM; the two amending texts were not read article by article, so a project should confirm the current wording before it relies on any single provision below.
Transport and sale are mining business activities
The definitions section of PP 96/2021 fixes what the two words mean, and it fixes an endpoint:
- Pengangkutan (transport) is the mining business activity of moving mineral and/or coal from the mining area and/or the processing and/or refining place to the point of hand-over (Article 1, point 26). The Indonesian term is *tempat penyerahan*.
- Penjualan (sale) is the mining business activity of selling mineral or coal mining output (Article 1, point 27).
- Operasi Produksi (production operation) is defined to include construction, extraction, processing and/or refining, development and/or utilisation, and transport and sale, together with the means of controlling environmental impact (Article 1, point 20).
- The Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan is a business licence granted to a company to buy, transport and sell mineral or coal commodities (Article 1, point 15).
Two consequences follow from that drafting. First, hauling is not a shipping arrangement bolted onto a mine; it is the final stage of production operation, and it ends at a point of hand-over the law names. Second, buying and reselling mining output is not an incidental trading activity — it is a licensed business.
Who hauls and who sells
The holder is not obliged to do the work itself. Article 46(3) provides that where an IUP Operasi Produksi holder does not itself carry out transport and sale, that activity may be carried out by a holder of an Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan. The structure mirrors the treatment of processing: a holder whose permit covers extraction but not the next stage can contract that stage to a licensed party rather than expand its own scope.
The haul road and the infrastructure outside the licence
The mine road has its own chapter. Article 173 requires IUP and IUPK holders to use a mining road (*Jalan Pertambangan*) in carrying out mining activities, and defines it in two parts:
- a haul road within the mining area or project area, used by the main and supporting production equipment; and
- a supporting road provided for moving goods or people within a mining area and/or a supporting project area.
That road may be built by the holder itself, or in cooperation with another IUP or IUPK holder, or with another party that has a road usable as a mining road — but only after the mining-safety aspects are met (Article 173(3)). Where the cooperation is with a road owner, the parties may sign a road-utilisation agreement (Article 173(4)), and that agreement must observe the principles of fairness, reasonableness and benefit (Article 173(5)). If no supporting road exists, the holder may use public infrastructure, including public roads, once the regulations are satisfied (Article 173(6)). Under Article 174 the holder must meet mining-safety aspects in building and using the road and may, with the approval of the official responsible for mining-safety aspects, give the community access to it.
Fixed facilities do not have to sit inside the licensed area, but they do not escape the permit either. Under Article 45, an IUP holder may apply to the Minister for an area outside its WIUP to support the mining business, provided the area is not for extraction itself and forms a single unit with the mining business, and the holder remains responsible for good mining practice there. The elucidation of Article 45 names the kind of facilities meant: ports (*pelabuhan*), mining roads, and processing and/or refining plants. That is the provision under which a dedicated stockpile, terminal or port can sit outside the licence boundary yet still inside the permit's discipline.
The transport-and-sales licence: who may hold it and on what evidence
Article 135 places the licence with the Minister and lists who may apply — a business entity, a cooperative, or a sole proprietorship (Article 135(1)). The application must carry a defined set of evidence (Article 135(2)):
- an application letter;
- a business identification number (*nomor induk berusaha*, NIB);
- the management structure, list of shareholders or capital, and list of beneficial owners of the entity, cooperative or sole proprietorship; and
- a source of mineral or coal supply, evidenced by a copy of a memorandum of understanding or a transport-and-sales cooperation agreement that is still in force with a holder of an IUP, IUPK, IUPK-as-continuation-of-contract/agreement, IPR, SIPB, KK, PKP2B, and/or another Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan.
The term is set at five years, extendable for five years on each extension (Article 136(1)). An extension application is filed no earlier than six months and no later than one month before the licence expires (Article 136(2)), and the extension pack must include the still-valid supply agreement and a final report on the transport-and-sales activity (Article 136(4)).
The diligence point is blunt: the licence is tethered to a physical source of supply. A trader with no live supply agreement with a permitted producer is not an applicant on these terms — and a buyer reviewing a counterparty's licence should read the agreement behind it.
Mining services: transport is a service line, and local comes first
Transport is also a recognised line of mining services, and it carries a nationality preference. Article 137(1) requires IUP and IUPK holders to use local and/or national mining service companies, and Article 137(2) lists the service types — including transport (*pengangkutan*) — alongside general survey, exploration, feasibility study, mining construction, environment, reclamation and post-mining, safety, and extraction. A foreign contractor hauling for a mine therefore sits behind a rule that gives local and national providers first position.
Selling: domestic priority, benchmark price and export conditions
On the sale side the framework is a set of priorities and a price discipline:
- Domestic first. IUP and IUPK production-operation holders must prioritise mineral and/or coal for domestic needs (Article 157(1)), and the Minister may determine what those domestic needs are (Article 157(2)).
- Domestic and export. Sales may be made domestically and/or abroad (Article 158(1)). Mineral may be exported only after minimum processing and/or refining limits are met and domestic needs are satisfied (Article 158(2)). Coal may be exported only after domestic needs are satisfied (Article 158(3)).
- Benchmark price. A holder that sells the mineral or coal it produces must refer to the benchmark price (*harga patokan*), which the Minister sets on a market mechanism or in line with prices generally prevailing on the international market (Article 159).
- Domestic price-setting. To meet domestic needs, the Minister may set the sale price of mineral and coal (Article 160).
- Production and sales control. The Minister controls production — for environmental compliance, resource conservation and reserve resilience (Article 163) — sets an annual national production plan (Article 164), and controls the sale of mineral and coal (Article 165).
The June 2026 supervision layer
Kepmen ESDM No. 229.K/MB.01/MEM.B/2026, dated 3 June 2026, is aimed at compliance of IUP, IUPK, IUPK-as-continuation, KK, PKP2B and Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan holders. Its recitals state the purpose plainly: to prevent the potential loss of state revenue from under-invoicing, transfer pricing, and/or manipulation of quantity and/or quality reports in the sale of mineral and coal.
The decree directs, among other measures:
- that surveyor technical verification of the transport and/or sale — carried out through the Sales Verification Module (*Modul Verifikasi Penjualan*, MVP) application — be done transparently and accountably;
- that the sales report be reconciled against payment of the royalty (*iuran produksi*) made through the e-PNBP application at the Directorate General of Mineral and Coal;
- that royalty payment in e-PNBP be blocked at the request of the Ministry of Finance;
- recommendations to the Ministry of Finance, within its customs authority, to carry out physical inspection of mineral and/or coal destined for export, and to raise the risk-management status of a commodity to priority for physical inspection on the strength of data or intelligence; and
- sanctions for a surveyor that fails to carry out the technical verification as required.
The decree also provides for coordination with the Ministry of Finance on exchanging data and intelligence on transport and sales. Read as a whole, it is a supervision instrument rather than a new permit: it does not create a fresh licence, it tightens the verification of the one that exists and links the report of the movement to the royalty receipt.
What it means for a foreign investor
- Logistics is a licence, not a hire. If the operator does not haul and sell its own output, the party that does holds an Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan — and that licence must rest on a live supply agreement with a permitted producer.
- The road and the terminal are permitted assets. The haul road follows the Article 173 rules, and a port or plant outside the licensed area rides on a separate ministerial approval under Article 45. A logistics plan is therefore a permitting plan.
- The licence is time-bound and evidence-bound. Five years, renewable in five-year steps, with a renewal file that includes the supply agreement and a final activity report. A counterparty whose licence is near expiry or whose supply agreement has lapsed is a compliance risk before a commercial one.
- Domestic priority is structural, not discretionary. The obligation to prioritise domestic needs sits on the seller, and it conditions coal and mineral exports. An offtake model that assumes free export has the sequence wrong.
- Movement is auditable since June 2026. Surveyor verification through the Sales Verification Module and royalty reconciliation through e-PNBP together mean the reported tonnage, the quality statement and the royalty receipt are meant to agree — and export cargo can be pulled for physical inspection.
Catatan Teramine
*This section is Teramine's editorial assessment, not a statement from any government body and not a recommendation.*
The two instruments read together describe a duty of consistency rather than a freight regime. PP 96/2021 tethers the transport-and-sales licence to a named source of supply and fixes the point of hand-over; the June 2026 decree tethers the reported volume to the royalty receipt and the exporter to possible physical inspection. For an investor underwriting an offtake, a trading arm, or a mine's logistics cost, that reframes due diligence: the two files worth reading closely are the supply agreement behind the licence and the royalty reconciliation behind the sales report. Where those agree, the chain is legible to the regulator; where they do not, the exposure is at the port, not at the pit.
The second observation is currency. The framework text is PP 96/2021, and it has been amended twice since — in 2024 and 2025. We read the text on JDIH ESDM and the record of the amendments, but not the amending texts article by article, so a project should confirm whether the transport-and-sales provisions changed before relying on this account.
The third is what the 2026 decree is not. It creates no new licence and no new fee line; it is a supervision decree aimed at the invoicing and royalty-reporting gap, and its consequences fall on surveyors and on exporters as much as on the producer. Read alongside the domestic-market and export rules, it points the same way: Indonesia is tightening the join between what leaves the mine and what the state is paid for it.
What we could not verify
- Any figure for logistics or haul cost, export volumes, royalty rates, or the number of transport-and-sales licences issued. This article reports rules; it reports no market, company or output figure.
- Whether the amending texts PP No. 25 of 2024 and PP No. 39 of 2025 changed the transport-and-sales provisions. We read the JDIH ESDM record of the two amendments; we did not read the amending texts article by article.
- The implementing Ministerial Regulation the framework refers to for the detailed procedure of the transport-and-sales licence under Article 136; it was not read for this article.
- Any named company, project, port or terminal. No operating company is named and no site is identified; the provisions read name none.
Sources
Both texts below were read directly from the legal information database of Indonesia's Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (JDIH ESDM). Every rule and date above comes from one of them.
- Peraturan Pemerintah Republik Indonesia Nomor 96 Tahun 2021 tentang Pelaksanaan Kegiatan Usaha Pertambangan Mineral dan Batubara, dated 9 September 2021 (Lembaran Negara RI Tahun 2021 Nomor 208) — official copy on JDIH ESDM (record id=2449; recorded as amended by PP No. 25 of 2024 and by PP No. 39 of 2025 as the second amendment). Read for Article 1 points 15 (the Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan), 20 (production operation including transport and sale), 26 (transport, ending at the point of hand-over) and 27 (sale); Article 45 (an area outside the WIUP for supporting activities, with the elucidation naming ports, mining roads and processing/refining facilities); Article 46(3) (transport and sale by an Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan holder where the IUP holder does not do it itself); Article 135 (who may apply and the required evidence, including the NIB, the beneficial-owners list and the live supply agreement); Article 136 (the five-year term, the renewal window and the renewal pack); Article 137 (the local/national mining-services preference and transport as a service line); Articles 157 to 160 (domestic priority, the domestic/export conditions, the benchmark price and the domestic price-setting power); Articles 163 to 165 (production and sales control); and Articles 173 to 174 (the mining road, cooperation and road-utilisation agreements, public-road use, mining-safety aspects and community access).
- Keputusan Menteri Energi dan Sumber Daya Mineral Republik Indonesia Nomor 229.K/MB.01/MEM.B/2026 tentang Peningkatan Pengawasan Terhadap Kegiatan Pengangkutan dan/atau Penjualan Komoditas Mineral dan/atau Batubara, dated 3 June 2026 — official copy on JDIH ESDM (record id=2776). Read for the recitals on preventing state-revenue loss from under-invoicing, transfer pricing and manipulation of quantity/quality reports; the scope covering IUP, IUPK, IUPK-as-continuation, KK, PKP2B and Izin Pengangkutan dan Penjualan holders; and the measures on surveyor technical verification through the Modul Verifikasi Penjualan (MVP), reconciliation of the sales report with royalty payment through e-PNBP, blocking of royalty payment at the Ministry of Finance's request, the recommendation for physical inspection of export cargo and prioritisation of a commodity's risk status on intelligence, the sanction on a surveyor that fails the technical verification, and coordination with the Ministry of Finance on the exchange of data and intelligence.
For the permit, document and compliance work behind this framework — the licence applications, the reporting and the royalty reconciliation — see our [permit services](/en/layanan-izin) page. Mining assets currently listed are on the [mining marketplace](/en/marketplace).
Read this alongside the rules on what may leave the country, [Indonesia mineral export ban](/en/news/indonesia-mineral-export-ban) and [Indonesia coal exports](/en/news/indonesia-coal-exports); the charge on the cargo, [Indonesia mining royalties](/en/news/indonesia-mining-royalties); the domestic-supply duty on coal, [Indonesia coal DMO](/en/news/indonesia-coal-dmo); the licence framework these sit inside, [Indonesia mining law](/en/news/indonesia-mining-law); and the annual plan that carries the production and sales budget, [what the RKAB is](/en/news/what-is-rkab-indonesia).
