JAKARTA - President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) invites all parties to maintain optimism. This is because Indonesia's economic growth is still positive.
This was conveyed by Jokowi when opening the 37th Trade Expo Indonesia in 2022 at ICE, BSD City, Tangerang, Banten, Wednesday, October 19, which was broadcast live on the official YouTube channel of the Presidential Secretariat. Jokowi said there are at least three reasons that can foster optimism, namely the first Indonesian economic growth which is still positive.
"In the midst of a crisis, in the midst of a recession, Indonesia in the second quarter still grew 5.44 percent. We must be grateful. We are among the countries that have the highest growth/economic growth among the G20 countries and other countries," said Jokowi.
Then the second reason is that inflation can still be relatively controlled at the level of 4.9 percent in the second quarter of 2022, even only to 5.9 percent after the policy of increasing fuel oil prices.
"Please later compared to our inflation with other countries, our growth/growth with economic growth in other countries," said Jokowi as quoted by Antara.
Then the third reason is that Indonesia's trade balance has a surplus throughout 2022, even at least one year earlier, namely until the last 29 months.
"It's been 29 months since we have continued to have a trade balance surplus. Earlier, Mr. Zul (Zulkifli Hasan -red) the Minister of Trade from January to September has reached 39.8 billion USD. This is not a small amount. This is also thanks to the hard work of ladies and gentlemen," said the President.
Therefore, the Head of State asked all parties to remain optimistic looking at the existing situation, including various estimates of existing international institutions.
"International institutions say that this year will be difficult, next year it will be dark, please other countries. Our country must remain optimistic," said Jokowi.
Nevertheless, Jokowi reminded that optimistic attitude must be accompanied by vigilance.
"You have to be careful, because the storm is difficult to calculate, difficult to predict, difficult to calculate where it will spread, what impact it will have on us," he said.
Closing his remarks, the President agreed with the hope of the Minister of Trade (Mendag) Zulkifli Hasan who conveyed that the 2022 Trade Expo Indonesia targets a trade value of 10 billion US dollars during its implementation.
"Hopefully later what was targeted by the Minister of Trade was more than USD 10 billion, we can really achieve it, and hopefully it can encourage our trade balance surplus in the future," said the President.
On an earlier occasion, the Trade Minister reported that before the President officially opened, there had been a contract agreement of 1.5 billion US dollars.
"This morning, the exhibition has not opened a 1.5 billion dollar contract. Therefore, we from the Ministry of Trade believe that after this exhibition, hopefully we can get a contract, from the results of this export, hopefully we can reach 10 billion US Dollars," said Zulkifli.
The Trade Expo Indonesia 2022 held during 19-23 October was enlivened with the Jakarta Muslim Fashion Week which was held 20-22 October.
Trade Expo Indonesia displays a number of key sectors such as manufacturing, health and beauty care, food and beverage, medical equipment, furniture and home decorations, as well as digital services.
In addition to transactions of 10 billion US dollars, Trade Expo Indonesia 2022 is also targeted to be able to present 66,000 visitors both online and offline from abroad.
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