Antara, Jakarta | Wed, 07/02/2008 3:20 PM
Indonesia is exploring the possibility of concluding Free Trade Agreements with Australia, New Zealand and India after signing similar pacts with China, ASEAN and South Korea, says a Finance Ministry official.
"We have held preliminary discussions with India, Australia, and New Zealand, but the most comprehensive talks were held with Japan," said the Finance Ministry's Fiscal Policies Board chief Anggito Abimanyu on Wednesday.
He said the agreements with the three countries would probably cover trade aspects rather than economic cooperation in a wider sense.
"But maybe they will only provide for free trade or reduction of import duties," Anggito said.
Commenting on the Indonesia-Japan Economic Partnership Agreement (IJ-EPA), Anggito said that under the agreed cooperation framework there were two import duty reduction schemes, namely the general reference tariff scheme and the user specific duty free scheme (USDFS).
Under the IJ-EPA, especially in relation to the general preference tariff scheme, it was agreed that Indonesia would lower of its duty tariff posts to zero percent starting on July 1, 2008, while Japan would lower 80 percent of its tariff posts.
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