RI signs deal with JICA

JAKARTA (JP): The government signed a memorandum of understanding on Thursday with the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) for technical assistance to local small and medium enterprises.

JICA's Takumi Ueshima said that the technical assistance would go to three local manufacturing and industry clusters, from the 10 clusters initially selected.

"A cluster is an agglomeration of enterprises within the same geographical area," JICA's associate expert Noriko Takahashi said, citing Cirebon for rattan products and Sidoarjo for machinery.

Ueshima said that the project, which will begin in October and last for two to three years, would aim at empowering the clusters so that they could help improve Indonesia's economic structure.

Without stating the exact amount, Ueshima said that JICA had budgeted approximately US$2 million to $3 million for the projects.

The assistant to the coordinating minister for the economy, Dipo Alam, said that he hoped one of the clusters up for preselection would be in the information, communications and technology sector, especially for the development of Internet kiosks. (tnt)