Sri Mulyani: Indonesia Takes Advantage Of The G20 Presidency To Accelerate Digital Financial Inclusion

Finance Minister Sri Mulyani (Photo: OJK Youtube screenshot)

JAKARTA - Minister of Finance (Menkeu) Sri Mulyani said the government will continue to promote digital financial literacy and inclusion as well as build strong consumer protection to support sustainable development. To achieve this goal, the Minister of Finance said that Indonesia would take advantage of the momentum of the G20 Presidency optimally.

"That is why during Indonesia's presidency (at the G20) we included pillar one, namely promoting productivity and ensuring inclusive sustainable growth in the financial inclusion agenda," he said when speaking at the OECD-OJK Conference on Financial Inclusion forum, Thursday, December 2.

According to the Minister of Finance, through a global partnership for financial inclusion at the Indonesian presidency at the G20 in 2022, the government will focus on three things.

“The first is a framework for implementing high-level principles on digital financial inclusion. Given the rapid growth of digital financing, Indonesia will encourage financial inclusion through digitalization to increase access to finance for both individuals and small and medium enterprises," he said.

Second, the policy choice to utilize digital and innovative financing services for small and medium enterprises which will include financial services outside of credit products from formal financial institutions including fintech as an alternative to financing small and medium enterprises.

And the third is the implementation of good policies to improve financial services for small and medium enterprises.

“Accelerating financial inclusion is very important in our chairmanship (at the G20), but we also believe that some cross-cutting issues beyond that are also important. Therefore, we also pay attention to the issue of consumer protection and financial literacy in the discussion of financial inclusion," he explained.

Furthermore, the state treasurer revealed that increasing consumer protection would be very important in line with the increasingly complex and dynamic development of the financial services industry.

"We need to strengthen the consumer protection system to increase consumer empowerment, increase awareness of financial institutions, and about the importance of consumer protection. In the end, we want to achieve increased public confidence in the financial services sector," concluded Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani.