Local content rules and import quotas have long underpinned Jakarta’s effort to protect and strengthen domestic industry, but now the government is seeking to use them as bargaining chips during upcoming negotiations with their US counterparts next week.

“There’s no need to ditch them just because another country raises its tariffs [against imports from Indonesia],” the Electronic Industries Association (Gabel) secretary-general Daniel Suhardiman told The Jakarta Post on Monday.

Such policies had successfully boosted local manufacturing and secured investors, he noted. “Non-tariff barriers are standard tools to protect any country’s market; why throw that away?”

President Prabowo Subianto in a broadcasted public event on Tuesday pledged to make local content requirements “more flexible” and scrap import quota licenses on certain commodities.

He also instructed that technical approvals, aimed to control imports on goods that are already produced locally, would now be handled and issued directly by the State Palace, rather than by ministries.

The Indonesian Medical Device Manufacturers Association (Aspaki) insisted on retaining local content rules, national standards (SNI), halal certifications and similar certifications, to safeguard supply chains and nurture domestic industry growth, Media Indonesia reported on Sunday after learning the key points that the US has problems with.