Japan mission arrives here
JAKARTA (JP): A Japanese mission arrived here yesterday to discuss Japan's aid for Indonesia under its Official Development Aid (ODA) scheme for fiscal 1994-1995.
The Japanese embassy said that the mission, led by Shigekazu Sato, the soft loan director of the Economic Cooperation Bureau of Japan's Foreign Ministry, will meet with Coordinating Minister for Economy and Finance Saleh Afiff and State Minister of National Development Planning Ginandjar Kartasasmita during its April 10-16 visit.
The mission consists of representatives of the ministries of foreign affairs, finance, international trade and industry, fisheries, forestry and agriculture, transportation, post and telecommunications and the Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund (OECF).
Indonesia has been the largest recipient of Japan's official development aid. Japan, a member of the Consultative Group for Indonesia, pledged $1.44 billion in economic and technical assistance for Indonesia in fiscal 1993-94.(03)
Voksel's new cable plant
JAKARTA (JP): PT Voksel Electric, an electricity cable producer, starts operating its new Rp 40 billion (US$18.67 million) plant in Cileungsi, Bogor, West Java, to produce middle-voltage cables.
"The new plant, with an installed capacity of 6,000 tons of 20-kilovoltage cables per year, is expected to meet the increasing demand for cables in the country," Voksel's president, Sugih Tjandrawinata, said during the inauguration of the plant over the weekend.
He said the company, in cooperation with Showa Electric Wire and Cable Co. of Japan, has thus far produced around 19,500 tons of aluminum low-voltage cables, 1,160 tons of enameled wire and 1,750 single core kilometers (ScKm) of telephone cables per year from its plants in Pulogadung and Cakung, both in East Jakarta.
Most of its products are supplied to the State Electricity Company (PLN), PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia (Telkom) and PT Indosat. PLN is reported to need some 15.4 million kilometers of cable per year, while the demand for telephone cables is estimated at 28.3 million ScKm. (fhp)
Exhibition ship introduced
JAKARTA (JP): The Agency for the Management of Strategic Industries (BPIS) will prepare a semi-container ship, to be called Caraka Niaga III-7, for a floating center that can be leased to private companies to promote their goods.
Achmad Subianto, an official of BPIS's Economic and Finance Department, said in Pantoloan, Central Sulawesi, on Saturday, that the ship will be available for private companies soon after it completes an exhibition tour of the 27 provinces in Indonesia.
According to Achmad, the floating exhibition on Caraka Niaga III-7 will have many advantages because such a mobile exhibition is able to reach potential markets with a greater number of prospective buyers. (03)
S'pore retains tax privilege
SINGAPORE (Kyodo): Japan on Saturday acceded to Singapore's request to retain until the year 2000 a tax privilege that Japan grants to developing countries, although the island republic is now Southeast Asia's most developed economy.
Under a taxation agreement signed by officials from the two countries here on Saturday, most Japanese companies operating in the island republic will continue to be exempted from taxation on their profits both in Singapore and Japan.
Currently, most Japanese companies here are exempted from paying corporate tax because Singapore has offered tax concessions to attract foreign companies to set up businesses in the country.
These companies also do not pay tax in Japan because Japanese tax authorities view them as having paid tax in Singapore -- a privilege Japan normally grants only to developing countries to help them lure much-needed foreign investments to build up their economies.
EU's investment projects
ATHENS (AFP): Finance minister of the European Union meeting here over the weekend identified 10 large projects -- mainly high-speed rail and roads -- to kick off a large-scale investment program to boost economic growth.
But France, Britain and Germany maintained their opposition to helping fund the projects through special "union bonds".
EU Finance Commissioner Henning Christophersen said the 10 projects would be formally approved at an EU summit in June, and construction work would start within two years.
British Chancellor of the Exchequer Kenneth Clarke said: "I wasn't the only one to express doubts about a new loan."
The meeting focused on a 120 billion Ecu (US$135 billion) project to build transport, telecommunications and energy networks across Europe by the turn of the century, which was launched at an EU summit last December.
It is a key part of an EU initiative to fight unemployment and promote recovery from economic recession.
Most countries remained skeptical of an earlier European Commission proposal to raise a six-year loan of 48 billion Ecu ($54 billion) to finance the some of the work, saying that existing sources of finance were sufficient.
Russian oil output falls
MOSCOW (Reuter): Russia's steep drop in crude oil output in the first quarter of this year is a direct consequence of the chain of debt strangling the economy, Fuel and Energy Minister Yuri Shafranik said.
"The decline in demand (due to lack of solvent consumers) has been accumulating for a long time...There comes a time when you just have to shut down wells," he told Reuters after a meeting devoted to the nuclear industry's financial crisis on Friday.
The Fuel and Energy Ministry's Infotek news service said on Thursday that crude oil and gas condensate output fell to 73.9 million tons in January-March from 88.3 million tons in the same 1993 period.
The fall of 13.4 million tons, 15.1 percent, was one of the biggest recorded since annual output started to slide from its 1988 Soviet-era peak of 570 million tons.
The latest first-quarter figures did not include output by joint ventures, but still suggested the 1994 output target of 327 million tons, down from 354 million in 1993, could be in jeopardy.
IDB's regional office in KL
KUALA LUMPUR (AFP): The Jeddah-based Islamic Development Bank (IDB) is to open a regional office in Kuala Lumpur later this year to coordinate its activities in Asia, its president was quoted saying Saturday.
"The opening of the Kuala Lumpur office, scheduled for the third quarter of the year, is part of our new strategy to expand the role of the IDB", Bernama news agency Saturday quoted Osama Faquih as saying.
Osama left for home late Friday after a brief visit to the Malaysian capital, where he held talks with Deputy Premier Anwar Ibrahim and Foreign Minister Abdullah Badawi.
The regional office's functions would include receiving project applications, monitoring projects and liaising with key officials in the Islamic countries of the region, Osama said.
The IDB, set up 19 years ago, has 47 members, including predominantly-Moslem Malaysia, which is one of its founder members.