A new agency is to be set up in Indonesia to investigate ways of solving problems besetting the country’s forestry-based industry.
Key aims will be to boost exports and resolve the raw material shortage. The agency will also look at protecting the forests and the environment.
Top officials from Indonesia’s Ministry of Trade and Industry and Ministry of Forestry will sit on the new agency – the Agency for Forestry-Based Industry Affairs and Sustainable Raw Materials.
One of their main jobs will be to curb illegal logging. Officials claim that locally made plywood is more expensive than products from overseas plywood manufacturers who can buy illegally cut logs smuggled out of Indonesia at much cheaper prices.
The industry hopes the agency will persuade the Ministry of Forestry to drop a planned logging moratorium which it says will drastically limit log supply. The Indonesian Wood Panel Association has predicted that around 75% of plywood companies will go bankrupt if the policy – scheduled to go live early next year – is implemented.
