Federation of Industry president Joe Zammit Tabona has welcomed the immediate removal of the remaining import levy on furniture, saying it would create the desired level playing field.
The 50 per cent of the levy still being charged on furniture was due to be removed on January 1.
The FOI had approached Economic Services Minister Josef Bonnici on the matter and proposed the removal of the levies, Mr Zammit Tabona said.
According to a survey it had carried out, the majority of members were in favour of the removal of the remaining levies earlier than planned and they believed this would be beneficial to both local manufacturers and importers.
Furniture manufacturers had experienced a decline in orders due to the planned removal of levies in January. Importers were offering pre-ordering concessions, resulting in a slowdown of orders for furniture manufacturers.
A specific request to advance the removal had been made by the Malta Furniture Manufacturers and endorsed by the Chamber of Commerce and the Federation of Industry on the basis that the majority of consumers have been postponing the purchase of furniture, to await the removal of the levy and get the resultant price reductions.
However, not everyone in the business felt that bringing the levy removal forward would make a difference. One furniture importer said that if the move had been made earlier, clients and businesses may have benefited. But, as it is, deliveries on orders today would still be made in around eight weeks' time, which meant an insignificant gap of a couple of weeks.
"At this point, what is the client going to gain?"
Furniture importers have been "selling for next year", with next year's reduced prices, from a year ago.
"We knew the new prices. You don't need to be a genius to calculate the price of the furniture without levies".
Anticipating the removal was, therefore, considered to be "comical" in that it would not result in a concrete difference, and was also "unfair" for those companies, which had not finished gearing themselves up for it.
Labour leader Alfred Sant said during a party activity yesterday that the removal of levies on the furniture industry of a certain size would result in major problems if these manufacturers did not find niches in overseas markets.
At the same time, the difficulties for smaller companies would be minimal because they produced tailor-made work, according to the particular needs of particular clients, which imported furniture did not.
Dr Sant said everything depended on the quality of life of the Maltese and whether they had enough money to be able to continue choosing local furniture, instead of foreign.
Speaking at a meeting with the self-employed from various localities, Dr Sant said a Labour government had been planning to remove levies for industry over a seven-year period.