Dien said this during an online working session with Ms. Tania Constable, General Director of Minerals Council of Australia and Australia’s leading coal and mineral exporters.

Currently, Australia is one of the largest coal mining and exporting countries in the world, with more than 200 million tons a year, worth US$40 billion of export revenue per year.

The Minerals Council of Australia is an organization representing the country’s enterprises in the fields of mining, processing and trading of minerals, including coal. It has 77 full members and 34 associate members who are enterprises and organizations operating in the mineral industry.

Members of the Minerals Council of Australia account for 75% of total mining output and 80% of total Australian mineral exports.

Faced with the urgent need to import coal for key production industries, Minister Nguyen Hong Dien suggested Australian coal exporters, especially members of the Minerals Council of Australia, increase their coal supply to Vietnam from April 2022.

It is estimated that Vietnam's coal import demand accounts for less than 5% of Australia's total coal exports to the world.

Ms. Tania Constable, General Director of the Minerals Council of Australia, affirmed that Australia has full capacity to supply coal and minerals for Vietnam's needs. She said that the council will coordinate and cooperate closely with the Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade in the coming time to promote cooperation between businesses of the two countries in increasing coal supply to Vietnam as well as in investment and technology transfer of sustainable coal and mineral exploitation in the two countries.

On April 1, the Minister of Industry and Trade worked with Australian Ambassador to Vietnam Robyn Mudie to find more sources of coal imports to ensure enough coal for domestic electricity production. Vietnam wants to sign a coal purchase contract soon to bring coal to Vietnam in April.

Previously, the Vietnam Coal and Minerals Corporation said that the world coal supply was scarce this year, and domestic enterprises could not import coal and turned to use domestic coal. This led to a shortage of coal even though production output did not decrease.

Coal output for thermal power plants in Vietnam 2022 is estimated at 35 million tons, mainly from imports. In the first quarter of 2022, this group imported only 325,000 tons.

Le Ha