Govt mulls another task force for businesses

Govt mulls another task force for businesses

Rendi A. Witular, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government plans to set up another task force to help seek
ways to resolve the lingering problems hurting the investment
climate at home and eroding the competitiveness of exporters.

The plan was proposed by Coordinating Minister for the Economy
Dorodjatun Kuntjoro-Jakti during a meeting between economic
ministers and some 80 business associations on Monday.

Dorodjatun himself will lead the new team, with some economic
ministers and business leaders as members.

But businessmen, who came to the meeting to demand concrete
action from the government to resolve problems associated with
the high cost of doing business here, were skeptical as similar
task forces set up before had not produced any concrete results
in resolving the lingering problems.

"This is just another way to try and calm down businessmen.
Forming another committee is not the solution, what we need is
concrete action from the government," said businessman Sofjan
Wanandi who also chairs the National Economic Recovery Committee
(KPEN), a business lobby.

He said that forming special teams seemed to be a trend now
among government officials to escape immediate responsibility in
resolving various problems.

But Dorodjatun defended it by claiming that the team would
serve as a forum for government officials and businesspeople to
discuss and resolve problems encountered in the manufacturing
sector and trade areas.

He expressed confidence that the special task force would be
able to resolve the factors causing inordinately high costs such
as bribes, corruption and inefficiency.

Chairman of the Indonesian Food and Beverage Association
(GAPMI) Thomas Dharmawan shared Sofjan's pessimism, saying that
the forming of the team was not necessary as the problems faced
by businessmen could be directly handled each related ministry.

"We have been facing classic problems that could have been
solved by the government ages ago if they were committed. From my
experience, the government-made teams only waste state money for
meetings without any concrete action or results," said Thomas.

Thomas said that the government should immediately take action
in scrapping all unfavorable policies issued by the central
government and provincial administrations that unnecessarily
created extra expenses and hurt businesses.

Businesses have long complained of the above problems, but the
pressure for a change intensified lately after the government
simultaneously increased fuel, electricity and telephone prices
in a bid to cut down expensive subsidies and comply with
International Monetary Fund (IMF) structural adjustment
directives.

During the past couple of years, investment, both foreign
direct investment and domestic investment, have been in tailspin.

The country's exports have also been dwindling as local
exporters are losing their markets to more competitive countries
like China, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam.

In a bid to help solve the problems, Minister of Industry and
Trade Rini M. Soewandi set up a special task force called the
crisis center, but most businessmen have not seen concrete
results.

Critics have previously said that to be fully effective, such
a crisis center should be headed directly by President Megawati
Soekarnoputri herself or at least by the coordinating minister
for the economy, given the good coordination and cooperation on
the part of other ministers needed to resolve the various
problems faced in manufacturing and trade activities.