JMTBA's role in machinery depreciation regs in Japan.

This month, Kenichi Nakamura will most probably be reelected to his second two-year term as chairman of the Japan Machine Tool Builders' Assn. (Tokyo) so that his executive team can continue lobbying for solving remaining "tax problems." The trade group's search committee, led by one of the four vice chairmen, Teruyuki Yamazaki, chairman of Yamazaki Mazak Corp. (Oguchi, Aichi Pref.), has already opted for his re-election.

Nakamura is president at JMTBA-member Nakamura-Tome Precision Industry Co. (Hakusan, Ishikawa Prefecture).

JMTBA is among a number of industrial associations that, together with the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry  (METI, formerly MITI), have recently had the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) amend some of Japan's depreciation rules. "For depreciable assets acquired on or after April 1, 2007," the Tax Bureau at the Ministry of Finance announced, "the final depreciable limit [95% of their acquisition costs to March 31, 2007] will be abolished." This will enable the assets to be depreciated to [yen] 1 at the end of their useful life.

In addition, the Diet (parliament) enacted amendments apparently designed to help Japan compete with, among other nations, South Korea in selected sectors of the electronics industry. The statutory useful life for the machines to produce both flat-panel displays and flat-panel films has been shortened from 10 years to five, while that for semiconductor photo-resist equipment cut from eight to five years, also effective April 1.

From our Asian correspondent.