found some of the article from today’s AFR. Staff crunch hammers...

found some of the article from today’s AFR.

Staff crunch hammers coal outputPeter KerBHP and Whitehaven Coal hope foreign workers can help solve a skills shortage that has contributed to a huge slump in production and lower exports at a time of booming commodity prices and rising concerns over energy security among major trading partners such as Japan.Coal output by BHP and Whitehaven Coal slumped dramatically over the past three months, while shipments through the Port of Newcastle over the past nine months were almost 12 per cent lower than the same time last year and 15.5 per cent lower than the same period in 2019.Both miners blamed labour shortages, absenteeism, wet weather and planned maintenance for the disruption, but Whitehaven said it would look after long-term customers amid the shortage, even if it meant accepting lower prices than could be secured on daily markets.Though BHP’s Queensland coking coal sales slumped by 25 per cent, the disruptions were most severe in the NSW thermal coal industry, where BHP’s sales sank by 38 per cent and Whitehaven’s by 32 per cent.Rainfall near the Hunter Valley coal town of Muswellbrook over the past three months was three times higher than for the same period last year, extending a two-year period in which output has been hampered by frequent flooding.The supply disruptions have exacerbated an extraordinary boom in prices for all types of coal, particularly thermal coal, which for the past five months has been fetching prices that are more than double the previous record which stood for 13 years before September 2021.Whitehaven said in August that it would moonlight as a property developer in the NSW Gunnedah basin to ease a housing shortage that was deterring prospective recruits. Yesterday it said it was preparing to transport workers to mine sites by helicopter if the flooding that had beset the region on multiple occasions over the past two years recurred.Whitehaven managing director Paul Flynn said there was no indication that labour availability was improving. ‘‘It is not turning around in the way we would like it to,’’ he said. ‘‘Trades are hard to find, there is no doubt about that, so we are looking at different roster patterns and including fly in, fly out arrangements.‘‘The government is building an airport in western Sydney, you have got Snowy [hydroelectricity expansion] going on at a pace, you have got [urban transport] tunnelling projects all still going on and all these [projects] are soaking up skills that we need.‘‘Even though we know the doors are open from our borders’ perspective, there is not the inflow of people we would expect from an expat perspective into the country.‘‘On that [foreign labour] topic we are very much focusing on the higher skills areas in particular, offshore people coming in to fill many of the roles at a more senior, technical level across our mines.’’