INDONESIAN MINISTRY TO PREPARE TAX HOLIDAY FOR PROCESSING INDUSTRIES

Surabaya, March 3 (ANTARA) - Industry Minister MS Hidayat said on Wednesday his office would prepare a tax holiday for processing industries.

"It (the tax holiday) is not an official program but it is important to boost the industrial sector, particularly agro-industries," he said after an interactive dialog at the Surabaya Institute of Technology (ITS).

He said the tax holiday would attract investors.

"To attract investment in processing industries (fishery, dairy, rubber, wood, seaweed, beef, palm oil, etc)there must be incentives for them to gain added value," he said.

The tax holiday would be made available to processing industries until they started their commercial production, he said.

He said a number of developed countries had offered such incentives to attract investors.

The matter was not provided for in the taxation law but in the investment law, he said.

"Therefore, we will formulate a new regulation that may support the inflow of investment in processing industries," he said.