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Businesses welcome another round of import policy revision
It is not clear what changes the government would introduce, but some businesses are in favor of reviving the import restrictions introduced in past regulations.
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Sorting it out: Employees prepare goods for shipment at a Lazada warehouse in Cimanggis, West Java, on Dec. 17. (JP/Seto Wardhana)
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everal businesses have welcomed a government plan to revise the country’s import policies less than a year after the latest amendment was introduced in May last year, a move deemed necessary amid struggling local industries, factory closures and sweeping layoffs.
The revision would target the Trade Ministerial Regulation No. 8/2024, which removed the need for technical approvals when importing goods in certain sectors. Some industries have said the regulation was a key factor in the decline of the country’s manufacturing output.
It is not clear what changes the government would introduce, but some businesses are in favor of reviving the import restrictions introduced in past regulations.
Redma Gita Wirawasta, chairman of the Indonesian Filament Yarn Producers Association (APSyFI), said on Tuesday that he had attended a discussion on the issue with the ministry in early January and that concerns in the textile, apparel and footwear industries had dominated the talk.
“We also talked about the overall condition of the sector. About 60 factories have shut down and hundreds of thousand people are losing jobs, it’s a dire situation,” Redma told The Jakarta Post.
During the meeting, textile producers demanded tighter import controls for all products under the harmonized system’s (HS) two digit codes of 50-63.
Surging imports had weakened not only the textiles industry, but also the upstream industries like petrochemicals, including key textile raw materials like purified terephthalic acid (PTA).
