According
to the Government, Indonesia’s trade balance with other countries is likely to
experience a deficit caused by the trade safeguard which are still pretty
loose. To that end, the Ministry of Industry is determined to tighten trade
safeguard.
Arryanto
Sagala, Head of Industrial Policies, Climate, and Quality Research Agency of
the Ministry of Industry in Jakarta (Monday, August 19), said that domestic
product safeguarding is the authority of the Ministry of Trade. Therefore, the
Ministry of Trade should be more intensively doing safeguard, such as
conducting anti-dumping programs and carrying out low enforcement on goods
which are not affixed with Indonesian National Standard (SNI) label and are not
valid for circulation. “We have to tighten trade safeguard if we do not want
the trade balance to continue to experience deficit”, he said
The
Ministry of Industry will also review provision of the Free Trade Agreement
(FTA) and Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) which is currently circulating.
He said that the implementation of the agreement has not reached 50%, but the
deficit of the trade balance is already large. Indonesia needs to tighten all
negotiations related to foreign trade.
Quoting
data of Ministry of Trade, in the first half of 2013, Indonesian Trade Balance
deficit reached USD 3.3 billion, consisting of oil & gas deficit USD 5.8
billion and non oil & gas surplus USD 2.5 billion. He reported that the
Ministry of Industry proposes the application of 21 new mandatory SNI to
protect the industry and markets in the country. Arryanto said that the
proposal for the application of the mandatory SNI is for the period of
2011-2012. Based on data of the Ministry of Industry, the 21 mandatory SNI
shall include self-ballasted lamp, air conditioning, refrigerator, and washing
machine. Mandatory SNI is also proposed for textile and toy product for safety
related to physical and mechanical properties, flammability, and migration of
certain element. SNI is also proposed for dye requirements and formaldehyde
levels in fabric for baby and children clothes.
According
to Aryanto, all the SNI application is directed to essential product, so that
similar product entered into Indonesia, their quality and safety are
guaranteed. If SNI requirements are followed consistently, there should no
longer be imported goods that can be sold at very cheap prices.
He
said that the implementation of mandatory SNI is part of the policy of domestic
industry safeguarding, in addition to the application of import duties,
precautionary measures, and export duties in accordance with Finance Minister
Regulation No. 67/2010 on the Stipulation of Export Goods subject to Export
Duty and Import Duty. Total number of SNI for industry sectors that have been
applied by the Government voluntarily an mandatorily has now reached 3,969 SNI.
Head
of the National Standardization Agency (BSN), Bambang Setiadi, said that for
this year alone, BSN sets to issue 500 SNI rules. So that it can generate 825
SNI rules in two years. Bambang said that some sectors that are their focus
next year are SNI for fisheries and tourism products. They will also be working
on SNI for energy management.
Other sectors are SNI for transportation, such
as street naming standards. SNI for transportation also includes SNI for
converter kit. The preparation of SNI for converter kit, according to him, will
take as long as one year provided that it only adjusts to the other existing
standards, such as ISO.
Business News - August 21, 2013
No comments:
Post a Comment