Australia drops dumping charges against Indonesia paper products

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Australian government has dropped its dumping allegations against two Indonesian export paper products, according to an Indonesian envoy.

Trade and industry attache at the Indonesian Embassy in Canberra Sutriono Edi was quoted Sunday by Antara as saying that the decision was made after the Australian Customs Service completed an investigation process.

Sutriono said that there was no evidence to prove the charges of dumping continuous computer paper and A4 copy paper.

He said that the Australian Ministry of Justice had approved the recommendation issued by the Australian Customs Service.

Sutriono said that although the Australian industry that produced similar products had suffered from "material injury", it was not caused by the alleged dumping of the Indonesian products.

The Australian Customs Servive investigation explored whether giant paper manufacturer PT Tjiwi Kimia and several other Indonesian paper producers had dumped their export products.

The investigation revealed that the volume of imported paper from Indonesia was only two percent of total Australian paper imports, an amount that can not give any "material injury" to Australian paper producers.

Sutriono, however, warned the Indonesian exporters and related associations to be aware of future potential Australian dumping accusations, especially if export volumes were more than three percent of Australia's total imports.

Indonesian paper exports to Australia totaled US$58 million from January to September 2001.