Jakarta – Tourism and Culture Minister Jero Wacik has announced that the government will increase a tax on foreign film imports by 100 percent.

"This is done in order to protect our domestic film industry. We are going to decrease the taxes for the domestic films in return," Wacik said Monday as quoted by kompas.com. Wacik had said last week that he had reached an agreement about the tax with local cinemas.

Commenting on the plan, Indonesia cinema businessman association head Joni Syafrudin said the plan to raise the tax would bring about the death of the local cinema industry.

"So far our local movies have not been able to attract large numbers of people. We are still dependent on foreign movies. Therefore, if the government insists on this absurd plan, then God knows exactly where all of this is heading," he said.

Achmad Ferdi, director of movie reduplication at Mitra Laboratory, shared a similar point of view, saying that the only action local cinemas could take to stay afloat was to increase ticket prices, which would also deter the public. "This problem leaves nothing but a huge dilemma for us cinema businesspeople," he said.

Earlier this year the government announced it would charge a 23.75 percent import duty on the 43 US cent royalty per film print. To protest the move, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) pulled out all Hollywood films, including dozens of blockbusters, from Indonesian cinemas.