Agriculture census has no link to taxes

JAKARTA (JP): The municipal Statistics Bureau is busy assuring the public that the data gathered during the upcoming agriculture census will not be linked to property taxes.

The head of the bureau, Poniman Suhartono, said yesterday the census, to be held in October, will focus strictly on agricultural companies and other related issues, not taxes.

Poniman urged the public to be cooperative in the census by giving correct, reasonable and straightforward data.

"The confidentiality of your answers is protected by the 1960 state law on census," Poniman said.

Sukayat Darmo Suwito of the Central Bureau of Statistics said earlier that the questions to be asked in the census will address staff size, the quantity and kind of fertilizers and medicines used, where the products are marketed and finances.

Follow-up

The census is to be done in follow-up to a similar one administered last October, whose results were presented last month to the representatives of the city's agricultural companies at the Kemayoran Trade Mart building, Central Jakarta.

During the presentation of the results of the agricultural census held last year, Ery Chayaridipura, the Head of the City Development Planning Agency concurred with Poniman on the need to help census officers do their jobs.

Poniman said that although the agricultural sector contributes less than one percent (0.7 percent) of the capital's total gross revenue from the business sector, accurate data on this sector is compulsory to completing the national census data.

He added that his bureau had trained 200 officers for the agricultural census.

The officers will collect data from agricultural companies, such as horticulture firms, the raisers of freshwater, as well as ocean fish, and cattle ranches.

Poniman said slaughterhouses, fish auction houses and cold storage facilities are also targets of the census. (arf)