Jokowi Targets 3 Million Vaccines Per Day, Sri Mulyani: Extraordinary Budget Mobilization

JAKARTA - Minister of Finance (Menkeu) Sri Mulyani said the government's efforts to accelerate the vaccination program to achieve the herd immunity target had consequences in the use of the state budget.

According to him, the State Budget as the government's fiscal instrument has a central role in supporting this.

“We are refocusing the budget, meaning that expenditures that are considered not a priority and can be postponed will be diverted. Later, the refocusing funds will be used in the health sector, such as testing, tracing, and treatment, especially to pay for the costs of patients affected by COVID-19," he said via the CNBC Indonesia channel, Monday, July 12.

The Minister of Finance added that in the instructions of President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) it was stated that the vaccination program had become very central amid the increase in daily cases in recent weeks.

“The President hopes that vaccination can be increased to 1 million per day and now it has been achieved. Then, the target is increased again to 2 million per day and is even expected to be 3 million per day by the end of this year. Of course, these targets must be accompanied by adequate budget mobility," he said.

Furthermore, the Minister of Finance said that concrete steps to support vaccination were evidenced by the addition of the health sector budget which had been revised several times.

“This is where spending on health rose from previously below Rp150 trillion to Rp172 trillion and now it is Rp193 trillion, so it clearly requires extraordinary budget mobilization. On the other hand, the community needs to be given social protection and we are trying to do this through social assistance," he said.

For information, the refocusing of the second semester of 2021 APBN has managed to collect a total of IDR 32.2 trillion. This amount was obtained from the budget refocusing of ministries/agencies at the central level of Rp. 26.2 trillion and another Rp. 6 trillion from the allocation of village fund transfer funds.