The Effect of Export Tax on Indonesia’s Cocoa Export Competitiveness

The government of Indonesia implemented an export tax policy on cocoa beans since April 2010 in order to develop cocoa processing industry. The objective of this article is to analyze the effect of export tax on Indonesia’s cocoa export competitiveness. The results indicate that with the implementation of export tax, cocoa export product composition shift from cocoa beans to processed cocoa products. On the other hand, Indonesia’s cocoa export growth is lower than the growth of cocoa world demand which is mainly caused by the decrease of competitiveness. Comparing the three cocoa beans producer, Ghana has gain competitiveness in 2011 compare to 2009.