Jokowi: Economic Recovery Is The Key In Investment

President Joko Widodo (DOK. BPMI Setpres)

JAKARTA - President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) emphasized that the key to national economic recovery after the COVID-19 epidemic is investment. This is because the State Revenue and Expenditure Budget (APBN) is limited and it is impossible to finance all development in the country.

"With regards to economic recovery, the key is in investment because our state budget does not allow all of this development to be covered from the state budget," said Jokowi during a limited meeting on the Handling of the COVID-19 Pandemic and the Vaccination Implementation Plan broadcast on the YouTube account of the Presidential Secretariat, Wednesday, 6 January.

On this basis, Jokowi asked ministries and institutions as well as local governments not to take actions that could potentially impede investment entry. On the other hand, Jokowi asked the ministries and institutions to the local government to accelerate investment-related services.

"What we want, the ministries, institutions, local governments provide fast and good service on investment," he said.

Especially for large investments, Jokowi advised the governor to step in directly so that the realization would actually take place in the field.

Jokowi also touched on the problem of gaps in domestic funding capacity and national financing needs. According to Jokowi, this gap occurs because of the high need for development financing, but on the other hand the budget deficit is increasing and the financing capacity of State-Owned Enterprises (BUMN) is increasingly limited.

Therefore, the government made another financing scheme, namely the Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) and this program was also introduced by Jokowi so that the governors could help implement it in the field so that investment could run quickly.

"We have a breakthrough in the framework of national financing, not only depending on the state budget or loan assistance, but we will have a Sovereign Wealth Fund called the Indonesia Investment Authority," he concluded.