TEMPO.CO, Jakarta – Indonesia and South Korea continue to finalize the Indonesia-Korea Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (IK-CEPA) negotiations, targeted for completion in May. One thing that has finished being discussed is the amount of import duty.:namespace prefix = o ns = “urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office” />

“What we want to finish quickly is how to set a fair and beneficial import duty to both countries,” Trade Minister Muhammad Lutfi said at the Industry Ministry on Monday, March 10.

Mr. Lutfi, along with Industry Minister M.S. Hidayat and Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) chief Mahendra Siregar, yesterday met the Indonesian Ambassador toSouth Korea, John A. Prasetio, to discuss the continuation of the IK-CEPA.

Last year, Lutfi said, trade value between Indonesia and South Korea reached US$23.015 billion, where Indonesia suffered a deficit of US$175.15 million.

Trading between Indonesia and South Korea consists of at least 8,593 tariff posts. Of these, 7,542 are not levied for import duty. The remaining posts are subjected to a duty of five percent until 2016.

During the course of said negotiations, South Korea has exempted import duties on 376 tariff posts and asked Indonesia to do the same for 114 of its posts. Meanwhile, Indonesia has freed 226 posts of any duties and asked the South Korean to free the duties for 81 posts. The main sectors covered are industry, agriculture, fisheries, and pharmaceuticals.

Minister Lutfi had said that the negotiation is expected to encourage investment and industrialization in both countries, hoping for investment growths in all sectors. “The only thing that is not discussed in the IK-CEPA is weapons,” he said.