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Govt upbeat about biodiesel settlement at WTO
The government is optimistic that a panel recently setup by the World Trade Organization (WTO) will settle its issue regarding the European Union (EU)âs anti-dumping measures on its biodiesel
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he government is optimistic that a panel recently setup by the World Trade Organization (WTO) will settle its issue regarding the European Union (EU)'s anti-dumping measures on its biodiesel.
The Trade Ministry's trade defense director, Oke Nurwan, said on Wednesday that the government was ready to attend the panel's first hearing.
'We'll ask our representatives to be proactive during the panel meeting,' he told The Jakarta Post.
The WTO agreed and setup on Monday a panel to discuss the anti-dumping case involving Indonesia and the EU. It was somewhat a surprising decision as the world trade body had rejected the formation of a panel in July.
A similar panel was set up in April last year and its personnel were appointed two months later for the same case between the EU and Argentina.
Indonesia's efforts to reach a settlement on this issue began on June 10, 2014 when it filed a complaint against the EU's anti-dumping measures on its biodiesel with the WTO's dispute settlement body (DSB).
The EU, which was once the largest importer of Indonesia's biodiesel, has imposed a five-year tax on biodiesel from a number of Indonesian companies, along with those from Argentina, since 2013.
The tax imposed on Indonesia's biodiesel ranges from around ¤76.94 (US$86.7) per ton to ¤178.85 per ton.
The 28-member bloc took the measure in response to a finding by the European Biodiesel Board stating that the import volume of biodiesel from Indonesia had surged from 157,915 tons in 2008 to 1.09 million tons in 2011, claiming that it was because the biodiesel was priced below the European market's fair value.
The government has stated that Indonesia's cheaper biodiesel price in Europe is due to the lower tax that the government imposes on biodiesel as it is included as a downstream product.
The Indonesian government has reiterated that it imposed different taxes on various products, with higher export taxes imposed on raw materials and lower taxes for processed products in an attempt to boost the local downstream industry.
Mahmud Syaltout, an international trade law and policy expert with the University of Indonesia (UI), argued that the government and concerned industry players had to painstakingly prepare data to support their arguments if they wanted to win the case at the WTO.
'The decision from the dispute settlement body will be final and binding, so Indonesia has to prepare complete supporting documents and verify them all ['¦],' he said.
Before coming to a final agreement, both Indonesia and the EU will go through a number of stages during the dispute settlement process, including panel reports to parties and WTO members, adoption of the reports by the DSB and possible appeals.
The panel on anti-dumping measures on Indonesia's biodiesel will also involve third-party countries, including the US, Japan, Turkey, Singapore, India, China, Canada, Argentina, Australia, Norway and Russia.
The EU's measures on Indonesia's biodiesel, according to the Biofuel Producers Association (Aprobi), has caused biodiesel exports to the European market to decline and forced most of Indonesia's biofuel producers to look at other potential markets.
