APEC creates impetus for small business to grow
APEC creates impetus for small business to grow
JAKARTA (JP): Tony Agus Ardie, a leader of the Indonesian
Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin), welcomed the strong
commitment made by APEC ministers in Osaka over the weekend to
launch joint efforts to nurture small businesses.
"The joint statement, issued at the end of the APEC
ministerial meeting on small and medium-scale enterprises, will
maintain the momentum of the political will of governments in the
region to develop small businesses," said Tony, Chairman of the
Indokor business group.
The economics ministers of the Asia-Pacific Economic
Cooperation forum, which met for two days in Osaka, reemphasized
the crucial role of small and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) to
maintain the dynamic economic growth in the region.
Tony, Vice Chairman of Kadin's Governing Council, hopes that
the APEC economic leaders meeting in Bogor in the middle of next
month will provide a clear direction, especially for small
business development.
"That, I think, will maintain the momentum of strong political
will to promote small enterprises which make up the majority of
businesses in the region," he added.
But of more importance, according to Tony, the APEC summit
will, hopefully, send a stronger message to Indonesian business
conglomerates that small business development and poverty
alleviation also contribute to sustainable economic development.
The gap between small and big businesses in Indonesia has been
dangerously wide and the number of absolutely poor people is
still relatively large, as President Soeharto himself has often
pointed out, he said.
In Tony's view, there have been too many big talks, meetings,
seminars and similar forums about the important role of, and the
need for, the development of small businesses and improving the
life of the poor.
Real action
"What is needed now is real action by strongly committed
businessmen because my own experiences in working with small
businessmen and even poor villagers show there are actually many
things, even simple ones, that big firms can do to help small
enterprises and to alleviate poverty," noted Tony.
He agreed with the views of the APEC ministerial meeting that
access to skills, information, technology, financing and markets
is the key to solving most of the problems hampering small
business development.
Tony cited the tie-ups his Indokor group developed with small
scale businessmen in quarrying sodium bentonite in East Java to
be supplied to oil and natural gas drilling firms.
"With adequate training and technical extension services the
small scale businessmen are able to produce sodium bentonite that
meets the American Petroleum Institute (API) standards," he
pointed out.
He added the process exacts learning costs that should be
borne by big companies. "But the bottom-line is quite positive in
terms of the business viability and contribution to develop the
capability of small scale entrepreneurs."
Indokor, and its five subsidiaries, produce drilling fluids
for oil mining firms; Provide a wide variety of services to the
petroleum industry; Produce bentonites for dam cementing and
bleaching earth for cooking oil; Farms shrimps and act as the
exclusive agents of various American chemical and environmental
technology products.
Tony said his company also avoided using modern, heavy
equipment in quarrying calcium bentonite in a barren land-area
near Sukabumi, West Java, in order to be able to employ local
people.
"We even avoid using our own trucks to carry the bentonite to
our processing plant in Merak on the north-western tip of West
Java to give business opportunities to local trucking firms," he
pointed out.
Indokor has also been doing similar programs in its shrimp-
farming ponds near Merak, where small scale farmers are either
hired as employees or trained as shrimp growers", using our
extension service and marketing networks," he added.
"So what big and medium-scale businessmen need is a real
compassion to help small scale firms and the poor people. If they
have the compassion, they surely will find the appropriate
opportunity," Tony added.(vin)