Under President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s watch, the total capital expenditure of state firms reached Rp 128 trillion, nearly a 400 percent increase compared to the previous government leadership, and is expected to continue growing.
“State enterprises have played an important role in the national economy in the last five years. They no longer burden the government as they used to. They are now capable of competing with private companies,” State Minister for State Enterprises Sofyan Djalil said on Thursday.
In a review of state firms’ performance during the five-year term, the state ministry for state enterprises concluded that most firms had managed to increase investment as demanded by shareholders.
The review shows that the total value of assets held by state firms jumped by 166 percent from Rp 1,192 trillion in 2004 to 1,978 trillion by the end of 2008, revenues by 220 percent to 1,162 trillion within the same period, and net profit by 212 percent to Rp 78.47 trillion.
Sofyan said the positive performance above was largely the result of cumulative earning increases in five sectors: 384 percent in the plantation industry, 260 percent in the mining industry, 200 percent in the transportation industry, 61 percent in the telecommunications industry and 10 percent in the banking sector.
He predicted that the mining and plantation sectors would grow faster as a result of better commodity prices, while other sectors such as construction, transportation and banking would also benefit from favorable macroeconomic conditions following an improvement in the global economy.
Other state firms in the fisheries, paper, printing and publication industries will not enjoy a similar growth for various reasons, he said, without elaborating further.
The review also shows that 23 out of 141 state enterprises suffered losses within the five-year period, down from 35 firms in the previous period. The total value of losses more than doubled from Rp 6.83 trillion by the end of 2004 to Rp 14 trillion in 2008, with state power producer PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara contributing losses of Rp 12.3 trillion.
To improve the performance of state firms, the ministry expects to extend the implementation of good corporate governance practices using various measures, including privatization.
State firms expected to enter the bourse within the near future include Bank Tabungan Negara, PT Pembangunan Perumahan, Garuda Indonesia and PT Krakatau.
The ministry also aims to make state firms more efficient by creating holding companies for firms operating in similar industries and reducing the total number of firms the government has a stake in to 89.
Mismanagement issues arose recently with the tax office announcing that state firms had failed to pay taxes amounting to Rp 19 trillion as of the end of September.
“We will coordinate with the directorate general of taxation about this unpaid tax. We hope the directorate general will give us some information about the companies so we can act accordingly,” Said Didu, secretary to the state minister, said. (naf)
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