Sri Mulyani: Indonesia Successfully Takes Advantage Of The Momentum Of The COVID-19 Pandemic For Reform

JAKARTA - Indonesia is believed to have succeeded in taking advantage of the pressures of the crisis, including the COVID-19 pandemic, as a momentum to carry out reforms on all fronts.

"Indonesia has always been proven to be able to take advantage of the crisis as a momentum to carry out reforms," said the Minister of Finance, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, in the Open Session of the 46th Anniversary of the Academic Senate at Sebelas Maret University in Solo, as reported by Antara, Friday, March 11.

According to Sri Mulyani, reforms must be carried out simultaneously with the recovery process, such as the structural reform agenda that is not postponed, but instead continues to be strengthened to build the economic foundation.

Reforms were carried out to address fundamental issues such as strengthening the quality of human resources (HR), ease of doing business, downstreaming, and economic transformation. "We understand that iron is easier to shape when it's still hot," said Sri Mulyani.

Not only structural reforms, Sri Mulyani continued, during the pandemic the government also continued fiscal reform efforts that had resulted in two important pieces of legislation, namely changes to the Financial Relations between Central Government and Regional Government (HKPD) Law and the Tax Regulation Harmonization Law in 2021.

Sri Mulyani said that these two pieces of legislation will strengthen state revenue policies and improve the quality of transfer spending to the regions so as to strengthen decentralization and regional autonomy.

In addition, the government also participates in maintaining the health and reliability of the State Budget (APBN), which is an important instrument for development and protects Indonesia from the impact of a deeper crisis.

Efforts to maintain the health of the APBN are carried out so that this instrument can continue to be a solution in dealing with various development challenges and turmoil as well as the threat of crises that have the potential to occur in the future.

"Reforming the state budget and state finances is a necessity and a necessity," she stressed.

This health is maintained through APBN reform which includes improving the quality and efficiency of central government spending, financing, and managing the treasury and state assets.

These various efforts have now had implications for Indonesia, which is starting to experience recovery and is getting back on track towards development goals and ideals.

“We have to be optimistic that the storm will pass. Even the hardest of winters fears the spring. Every era has a challenge, every challenge has an answer and every era has a character," said Sri Mulyani.