Government to tighten steel import

The government of Indonesia plans to tighten steel import amid global oversupply situation to help protect the local steel industry, Kontan reported on Saturday.

The paper quoted Coordinating Minister for the Economy Sofyan Djalil as saying that a number of measures have been prepared including a politic to anticipate dumping practices, calls for domestic industries to increase the use of local components including steel, and the application of the Indonesia National Standard (SNI) for all steel products used by domestic industries.

?Steel is currently in oversupply situation, if we don?t apply anti-dumping policy, the domestic industry will die,? Sofyan said.

Meanwhile, Minister of Environment and Forestry Siti Nurbaya warned the local steel industries against destructing the environment. She said that the ministry has identified 19 steel companies allegedly polluting the environment. (*)