Polish state-owned coal company Weglokoks has said that the country’s coal exports could halve this year while its imports will rise 10 per cent.

The company said today that it expects to export just under half of the amount of hard coal that it shipped in 2010, while it predicts shard coal imports will increase.

Jerzy Podsiadlo, Weglokoks' chief executive, told a press conference: “To a larger and larger extent our national economic demand is covered by steam coal imports and everything points to this trend continuing.”

He added that Poland's hard coal exports are falling not because of a lack of demand, but because of a lack of domestic coal production available for export.