The non-productive goods also included luxury goods, and Trade Ministry was lobbying state-owned companies to reschedule their plans to import capital goods this year.
Jakarta (ANTARA News) - The Indonesian government is seeking to control the import of non-essential and non-productive goods to reduce the burden of the country`s trade balance, according to Deputy Trade Minister Bayu Krisnamurthi.

"We will control the import of non-essential and non-productive goods more tightly," he said after a coordination meeting at the Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs here on Wednesday.

The non-productive goods also included luxury goods, he said.

Bayu said the Trade Ministry was lobbying state-owned companies to reschedule their plans to import capital goods this year.

"We have asked state-owned companies about whether the importation of capital goods, such as aircraft, locomotives and machinery can be rescheduled," he said.

Indonesia`s trade deficit expanded by more than six-fold to US$3.31 billion in the first half of this year from a year earlier, as the impact of the global economic crisis continued to put pressure on the country`s trade balance.

According to the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), overall exports in the first semester of this year dropped 6.9 percent to $91.05 billion, driven by a drop in the shipment of non-oil and gas commodities and goods, while imports declined slightly by 2.16 percent to $94.36 billion, mostly due to the lower import of capital goods.

Just in July 2013, Indonesia recorded a trade deficit of US$2.31 billion consisting of US$1.86 billion from oil and gas trade and US$0.45 billion from non-oil/non-gas trade.

The volume of oil and gas trade recorded a deficit of 1.35 million tons, while the volume of non-oil/non-gas trade enjoyed a surplus of 44.21 million tons.

Cumulatively, in the year to July 2013, non-oil/non-gas trade saw a surplus of US$1.9 billion and trade deficit reached US$5.65 billion.

On Tuesday, Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan projected the country`s trade deficit to exceed US$6 billion this year.(*)

Editor: Heru Purwanto
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