Govt attempts to nurture stagnant high-tech industry
Govt attempts to nurture stagnant high-tech industry
Rendi A. Witular, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Indonesia is striving to become a supplier of telecommunication
equipment and infrastructure within five years, with a blueprint
currently being drafted that contains the necessary policies for
developing the industry.
Included in the blueprint will be a number of fiscal and non-
fiscal incentives for local investors willing to initiate the
manufacturing of telecommunication equipment, said Basuki Yusuf
Iskandar, the newly installed director general of post and
telecommunications.
Basuki's directorate is now under the auspices of the Office
of the State Minister of Information and Telecommunications.
"Indonesia is lagging behind in telecommunication equipment
and infrastructure manufacturing. My first strategy to develop
the industry will be to prepare a blueprint for it," Basuki told
The Jakarta Post when accompanying President Susilo Bambang
Yudhoyono in a ceremony on Monday.
The blueprint will be made in cooperation with the Office of
State Minister of State Development Planning and the Ministry of
Industry. It is hoped it will be completed by early next year.
Despite the rapid progress in the country's telecommunication
service providers, Indonesia has little to offer in manufacturing
telecommunication equipment and infrastructure, due to the lack
of capital and skilled human resources for operating a
manufacturing plant.
In order to encourage local investors to engage in the
industry, the government will offer fiscal incentives, namely an
exemption on import duty for capital goods as well as reduction
in value-added tax and income tax, Basuki said.
Basuki said that the focus of the industry in the near future
would be on the manufacturing infrastructure for
telecommunication networks, mobile handset and satellite
equipment.
"The strategy is also aimed at making the country self-
sufficient in providing such facilities. We want our industry to
also play a role in the global market," he said.
Basuki's other strategy to develop the industry is to make
Telkom a global telecommunication company.
"The directorate is obliged to support Telkom in order to make
the company more profitable and to expand overseas," he said.
Basuki said that his directorate would gradually reduce
"facilities" provided by the government to Telkom to make it more
independent.
At present, Telkom is the only telecommunication company in
Indonesia that can provide adequate telecommunication services
for domestic fixed lines, international calls, cellular and code
division multiply access (CDMA).
The company had a long-standing monopoly on the domestic fixed
line facility before the government scrapped it and allowed PT
Indosat to enter the business last year.