Forestry and foreign exchange

Forestry and foreign exchange

From Media Indonesia

After reading a news story in Media Indonesia on July 28
titled New forestry minister should be able to develop
sustainable forests, I would like to suggest the following.

The government has asserted that foreign exchange receipts
from the forestry sector remain one of its main sources of
income. Therefore, the government should take short-term steps,
such as canceling the payment of the reforestation fund (DR) and
forest resources royalty (PSDH) three years in advance,
canceling the value-added tax on timber and the building and land
tax (PBB) on forest concession areas as they are already included
in the PSDH, eradicating illegal logging, preventing the
smuggling of timber and prohibiting the export of logs. In the
absence of speedy short-term steps, the bankruptcy of the
forestry sector, about which the general chairman of the
Indonesian Association of Forestry Companies (APHI), Adiwarsita
Adinegoro, has expressed fear for, will become a reality.

Bankruptcy is imminent as long as the government shows dualism
in its attitude to the forestry sector by letting it continue in
the prevailing situation on the one hand but issuing unreasonable
regulations on the other.

DEHEN BINTI

Banjarmasin, South Kalimantan