Hard Coal Production Competitiveness in Poland
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_________________ MINING ECOLOGY AND EXPLOITATION ____________________ OF THE EARTH’S BOWELS
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Hard Coal Production Competitiveness in Poland J. Dubińskia, S. Pruseka, M. Tureka*, and J. Wachowicza a
Central Mining Institute (GIG), Katowice, 40-166 Poland *e-mail: [email protected] Received November 5, 2019 Revised January 10, 2020 Accepted April 10, 2020
Abstract—An analysis of the competitiveness of the Polish hard coal mining sector was performed. The most important conditions in which it operates were presented—the size of the resource base, the current organizational structure, and operating conditions. By presenting the most important sources of competitiveness, factors requiring special attention were identified. After presenting the SWOT analysis of the sector, the issues that were most important for the permanent preservation of the competitive position of the entire sector, as well as individual mining enterprises, were specified.
Keywords: Competitiveness, hard coal mining, exploitation, costs, opportunities and threats. DOI: 10.1134/S1062739120026806
INTRODUCTION
Hard coal mining in Poland has played and continues to play a significant role in ensuring the country’s energy security. This may be confirmed by the fact that in 2018 hard coal had almost a 50% share in electricity generation (Fig. 1). However, while until 1990 this ensured it a privileged market position (even regardless of the financial results of operations), after implementing the principles of the free-market economy, this kind of “competitive advantage” was lost. Moreover, formal and legal conditions resulting from Poland’s membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO) were added to this. Periodic decreases in the global consumption and prices of coal, as well as the expansion of seaports in the field of unloading coal from ships, combined with the modernization of the so-called “land ports”, caused a significant increase in the volume of this raw material import (in 2018 as much as 19.8 million tonnes of coal was imported to Poland, which was almost 1/3 the volume of domestic extraction). Increasing the possibility of importing coal has become a source of many problems in the functioning of mining enterprises, which, in order to be able to continue their activities, had to take numerous actions to reduce mining costs and increase their competitiveness. In order to maintain the competitiveness of hard coal production from deposits in Poland, it is necessary for mining companies to take many challenges. This was the subject of research, and this publication contains fragments of results obtained using the methods of systematic literature review and the SWOT analysis. It should be noted that the issue of competitiveness of hard coal production has been and is the subject of many studies conducted by a wide group of scientists working in various scientific centres. Their res
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