The government is to start fining people who violate a new regulation intended to force exporters to keep their foreign exchange earnings from natural resources in the Indonesian financial system.

Finance Ministerial Regulation (PMK) No. 98/2019 on tariffs and administrative punishment imposes fines and outlines the procedures for imposing levies.

Under the regulation, an exporter of natural resources who does not deposit export earnings in a special bank account within a certain period of time is required to pay 0.5 percent of the total foreign exchange earned as a fine, according to the regulation as quoted by kontan.co.id.

PMK No. 98/2019 derived from Government Regulation No. 1/2019 on requirements for exports to put their export earnings from natural resources into Indonesia’s financial system.

The commodities include those from mines, plantation, forests and the fisheries.

The government regulates the use of export earnings for a number of types of payments, including import tax, debts, dividends and others as stipulated in the investment law. Violators of the regulation are required to pay 0.25 percent of their total export earnings.

For export earnings, an exporter is required to have escrow accounts in an Indonesian bank. If the exporter has an escrow account in another country, it must be transferred to a bank in Indonesia.

If the exporter does not abide by the regulation, the government will issue further punishment in the form of delaying customs services.