President Jokowi: Maritime Key To Indonesia's Economic Development

PALU - President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) said maritime areas are the key to Indonesia's economic development because they are the path of mobility of goods and people.

"To support maritime areas, a port is needed as a transit place for sea transportation, as well as a location for loading and unloading logistics," Jokowi said during a working visit to Palu City, Central Sulawesi, as reported by ANTARA, Wednesday, March 27.

The President stated that Indonesia's 2/3 area is a sea, so maritime is naturally the key to national economic development.

Kareena, the central government continues to strive to improve port facilities in accordance with service standards, standard management, technology standards and is equipped with integrated logistics services and connected to other modes of transportation so that services are faster and more efficient.

"Indonesia must not lose to other countries, Indonesia has a good maritime area, so it needs to be utilized optimally," he said.

During his working visit, the President also inaugurated two ports in Central Sulawesi that had completed reconstruction (rehab-recon) as part of efforts to recover after the earthquake, tsunami and liquefaction disasters that hit Palu City, Sigi Regency and Donggala in 2018.

"The devastating earthquake that hit Palu City and its surroundings destroyed important infrastructure and facilities, one of the facilities severely affected, namely the Pantoloan Port in Palu and Wani Port in Donggala Regency," said Jokowi.

He is also happy that Central Sulawesi quickly rose from the slump of the impact of natural disasters, now the government is reorganizing regional infrastructure so that economic activities are getting better.

The President said the rehabilitation of ports in the Palu Bay area spent a budget of Rp233 billion with the aim of restoring the function of ports affected by the disaster, then increasing the capacity of port services as a node for logistical activities.

"The current global condition is competition or competition in strengthening the country's economy, who is fast, the winner will win the world's 'economic cone'. Indonesia must take part in winning this competition by preparing strong supporting infrastructure, strong human resources and strong economic management," said Jokowi.