Overseas investors may get permanent residency

Overseas investors may get permanent residency

Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) said on Monday that
it was considering allowing foreign investors with a minimum
investment of only US$100,000 to obtain permanent residency in
this country.

"We are considering granting permanent residency for foreign
investors based on an investment value of at least $100,000,"
BKPM chairman Theo F. Toemion said following a meeting with a
number of Japanese investors at his office.

"Such an incentive package has been included in the new
investment draft law which will be submitted to the House of
Representatives for deliberation this month," he added.

According to Theo, the plans to offer incentives are aimed at
attracting more foreign investors back to the country to help
restore the economy to health.

Under the proposed bill, the government will offer fiscal and
non-fiscal incentives, and provide equal treatment both to
foreign and local investors.

The government would also establish a one-stop service center
to boost the country's attractiveness in the eyes of foreign
investors.

The new bill will replace the existing Foreign Investment Law
No. 1/1967 and Domestic Investment Law No. 11/1970.

Meanwhile, Shuichiro Tsuchiyama, an international business
adviser with the Japan Small and Medium Enterprise Corporation
(Jasmec) welcomed the BKPM's plans to offer permanent residency
as an incentive.

"Such permanent residency will encourage hundreds of Japan's
small and medium enterprises to come to Indonesia," he explained.

He said that around half of Jasmec's 400 members could come to
invest in Indonesia following the introduction of the new ruling.

But he said that the Japanese small and medium investors had
initially expected the Indonesian government to grant them
permanent residency based upon an investment of only $50,000.

Takasihi Onda, secretary-general of the Association of South
East Asian Nations (ASEAN)-Japan center, said that the interest
of Japanese investors in coming to Indonesia remained strong.

However, he urged the government to immediately restore the
investment climate here to attract Japanese investors who were
now considering shifting their production bases outside Japan.

"The Indonesian government must be able to assure Japanese
investors of stability in both politics and the local currency,"
he said.

A number of Japanese small and medium enterprises are now
visiting Indonesia to seek investment opportunities.