The government through the Ministry of Finance issued regulations for the imposition of Safeguard Measures Import Duty (BMTP) on imports of clothing products and clothing accessories. The regulation is contained in the Minister of Finance Regulation (PMK) number 142/PMK.010/21 which is valid for three years. Therefore, people who like to buy ready-made clothes and accessories need to know the range of the BMTP amount. The 134 tariff posts for clothing and accessories were charged between Rp. 19,260 to Rp. 63,000 per piece for the first year and growing downwards in the second and third years.
The types of products worn consist of the casual segment, formal tops, bottoms, settings, ensembles, dresses, outerwear, clothing and clothing accessories, headwear, and neckwear.
There is also a policy basis for imposing BMTP on products and accessories which will take effect from November 12, 2021, derived from the results of the investigation report of the Indonesian Trade Security Committee.
The results of the report prove the threat of serious losses experienced by the domestic industry caused by the number of imports of clothing products and clothing accessories.
From these imports, it causes or threatens to cause serious losses to the domestic industry.
The imposition of the BMTP is an additional general import duty or an additional preferential import duty based on the applicable international goods trade agreement.
However, to get the country, you must get a certificate of origin (COO) from it.
The BMTP policy is expected to have a positive impact on the recovery of domestic industry performance and curb imports of clothing products and clothing accessories.
In this way, the domestic economy can increase in line with the increase in domestic consumption, which will also have an impact on increasing gross domestic product and employment.
General Chairperson of the Indonesian Textile Association (API) Jemmy Kartiwa said that the policy for importing BMTP products and clothing could be conveyed by the BMTP policy or security for imported textile raw materials that previously applied and encourage business people to produce domestically.
"If the (BMTP) for clothes is zero, people will buy clothes in droves without having to bother to make them domestically," said Jemmy.
According to Jemmy, the BMTP policy will not have a significant impact on the global brand garment business, because the global brand garment market segment will not be too affected by the addition of tens of thousands of prices.
On the other hand, this policy can also benefit small and medium-scale garment businesses, because the imposition of BMTP can have a significant impact on the low-to-end garment import segment which is in direct competition with garments produced by local SMEs.
Contacted separately, APSyFI Secretary General Redma Gita Wirawasta said that the BMTP policy on imports of clothing and clothing accessories could spur demand in the textile industry chain at the upstream level.
"When there is additional demand downstream, there will also be additional demand from fabric to fiber," said Redma.
Unmitigated, Redma even estimates that the utilization of the upstream textile industry production can reach its maximum in the coming periods so that the industry needs to make new investments to increase production capacity in 2022/2023.
To note, currently the total installed capacity of the upstream textile industry is around 2.5 million tons per year. Based on APSyFI's records, currently the utilization of the upstream textile industry production itself ranges from 85 percent to 90 percent.
The driving factors include the declining supply of competitor goods from China and Vietnam in line with the energy crisis in China and the lockdown policy in Vietnam. "If we don't add more investment, it will be short in 2024," said Redma.
