Giant Closes, Ministry Of Trade: Very Unfortunate

Giant Supermarket outlets. (Photo: Doc. HappyFresh)

JAKARTA - Director General of Domestic Trade of the Ministry of Trade Oke Nurwan hopes that the closure of one of Giant's modern retail, does not creep up and affect other sectors, especially related to the distribution of Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) products.

"It certainly has a negative impact, hopefully not to propagate to other sectors, especially to distribute MSMEs products," oke said, quoted from Antara, Wednesday, May 26.

Oke explained, the closure of some retail outlets is an internal decision, but it is certainly a pity for the government.

"Of course, it is a pity, because in the midst of the pandemic one of the efforts to maintain national economic growth is household consumption which contributes very significantly, which is approximately 59 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP)," oke said.

Oke added, various incentives have been prepared in the form of economic stimulus, including the provision of corporate loans with highly competitive interest rates and efforts to increase the purchasing power of the community seeking social assistance and People's Business Credit (KUR) with low interest rates.

"Apparently for some companies can not help so have to close some outlets because of the pandemic that impacts multidimensional," tutur Oke.

Known, multiformat retail company PT Hero Supermarket Tbk (HERO Group) announced that following up strategically on its entire line of business, the company will focus its business on ikea, guardian, and hero supermarket trademarks that have higher growth potential than Giant.

With giant closing, within two years, Hero Group aims to double the number of IKEA stores compared to 2020, and open up to 100 new Guardian stores by the end of 2022.