The competitiveness of indonesian wood-based products

This paper analyzes the competitiveness of Indonesian wood-based products using revealed symmetric comparative advantage (RSCA), Spearman rank correlation (SRC), product mapping, and constant market share (CMS) analyses. RSCA results show that Indonesia had a comparative advantage in wood-based products, especially in Standard International Trade Classification (SITC) 245, 248, 251, 634, 635, 641, and 821. SRC results find that Indonesian wood-based products do not show a structural shift in comparative advantage during 1991-2010 while product mapping places Indonesia in group A (comparative advantage and a net exporter) in SITC 245, 634, and 635. CMS reveals that the increase in wood-based product export was caused by an increase in world exports, and commodity and market distribution effects. This study examines Indonesia's log export ban policies, which have been inconsistently implemented for the past several decades and adversely affect the country's global competitiveness, and recommends that Jakarta eliminate these policies and impose an appropriate export tax rate on logs.