GOVT TO MAINTAIN POLICY ON USED MACHINERY IMPORTS

Jakarta, Aug 27 (ANTARA) - The government decided to maintain its policy of allowing limited imports of used machinery to give a chance to less developed industries to grow, a senior official said.

Director General of Textile, Machinery, and Metal Industries of the Industry Ministry, Anshari Bukhari said here on Wednesday that his office and the Ministry of Trade were discussing the possibility of maintaining limited import permits for second-hand machinery in 2009.
In April this year, the government planned to lift the policy of allowing the imports of such products.
"Actually, the government intended to lift the import permit but the business world still needs the products," Bukhari said.
Therefore, the government, in this case the trade and industry ministries, is discussing how long the import of used machinery would be allowed, he said.
He said that the discussion tended to take a decision of restricting the importation of used machinery by issuing a list of types of machinery which would be allowed to be imported.
He said that Industry Minister Fahmi Idris hoped that only industries which would use the machinery would be allowed to import them, not industries which would resell them.