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.