Meeting The Minister Of Eurasia, Minister Of Trade Zulhas Bahas For Accelerating The Settlement Of FTA Indonesia-EAEU Negotiations

Minister of Trade Zulkifli Hasan (right) (Photo: Mery Handayani/VOI)

JAKARTA - Trade Minister Zulkifli Hasan emphasized that the cooperation between the Indonesian economy and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) must be strengthened.

Therefore, the approval of free trade (FTA) between the two countries must be completed.

This was conveyed by Zulhas as Zulkifli Hasan's nickname at a meeting with members of the Integration and Macroeconomic Council of the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEEC) Sergei Glazyev in Jakarta, on Friday, January 27.

"I congratulate Indonesia and EAEU members for the launch of the IEAEU-FTA Negotiation last December. The launch of the FTA Indonesia-EAEU negotiations is a historic momentum to improve bilateral relations to a higher level," he said in an official statement, Friday, January 27.

Previously, the IEAEU-FTA negotiations were officially launched by the Minister of Trade of the Republic of Indonesia and members of the Council of Trade Ministers of EAEU on December 5, 2022. Currently, the two parties are still preparing a reference draft for the IEAEU-FTA negotiations.

The first round of negotiations are planned to be held in the first quarter of 2023, namely in March or April this year and are targeted to be completed within two years.

Some coverage of the issue of negotiations in the IEAEU-FTA includes trade in goods, rules of origin of goods (rules of origin), trade security (trade remedies) trade facilitation procedures (customs procurement and trade facility), sanitation and fitness, intellectual property rights, technical barriers to trade, business competition, and digital trade.

At the meeting, the two ministers also discussed the Indonesia-EEC Joint Working Group (JWG).

Zulhas said that Indonesia and the EEC have a Memorandum of Cooperation to form JWG as a discussion forum on technical cooperation in the context of increasing trade and investment.

"Indonesia welcomes various initiatives in order to optimize the potential for bilateral economic relations, it is very important for both parties to resolve negotiations as soon as possible," said Zulhas.

For your information, the Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) was signed on October 17, 2019, on the sidelines of the Trade Expo Indonesia.

The memorandum of cooperation will be used as the basis for starting technical cooperation in various fields to increase trade and investment and reduce barriers between the two parties.

Meanwhile, Minister Sergei said that although bilateral trade relations were good enough, there was still room to improve.

"The FTA agreement and technical cooperation discussions under the Cooperation Memorandum are expected to drive trade and two-way investment flows," he said.

For information, in the January-November 2022 period, Indonesia and EAEU's total trade reached 4.0 billion US dollars, an increase of 32.75 percent compared to the same period the previous year.

Meanwhile, in 2021, trade between the two countries will be recorded at US $ 3.33 billion.

In this period, Indonesia's exports to EAEU were recorded at 1.52 billion US dollars, while Indonesia's imports from EAEU were recorded at 1.82 billion US dollars.

Indonesia's main exports to EAEU include palm oil, copra coconut oil, natural rubber balances, leather footwear, and margarine.

Meanwhile, Indonesia's imports from EAEU include mineral/chemical fertilizer (calium), half-oil steel products, fero alloys, briquette coal, and mineral/chemical fertilizer (nitrogen).

In 2021 EAEU will occupy the 30th position as a source of Indonesia's foreign direct investment (FDI) with an investment value of 23.2 million US dollars consisting of 214 projects.

This value increased by 404.49 percent compared to 2020 which was recorded at 4.6 million US dollars.