RI's open unemployment reaches 6.3 million: Minister

JAKARTA (JP): The government warned yesterday that unemployment was getting out of hand with rising open unemployment and a steady rise in the number of unemployed university graduates.

Open unemployment last year was estimated at 6.3 million people or 7.24 percent of the country's 86.4 million-strong workforce, Minister of Manpower Abdul Latief said yesterday.

"The unemployment rate increased from 3.17 percent or 2.3 million people in 1990," Minister of Information Harmoko quoted Latief as saying yesterday to a limited cabinet meeting on the economy.

Harmoko said after the monthly meeting that the country's workforce increased 16.91 percent to 86.4 million in 1995 from 73.9 million in 1990, while the number of job-seekers (openly unemployed) increased to 6.3 million from 2.3 million.

He said 218,473 of the unemployed in 1995 were university graduates, up 1,293 on the previous year.

"Only 36 percent of our university graduates annually have been absorbed by the labor market," he said.

Latief defined openly unemployed as those working less than an hour a week.

"The unemployment problem has therefore assumed a more dangerous level," Harmoko said, adding that the provincial governors had been instructed to support the national labor plan.

Incentives

The government will provide financial incentives to encourage private firms to employ more people, and will temporarily employ university graduates in government projects, he said.

Harmoko said the government would encourage university graduates to create their own businesses and work in cooperatives.

President Soeharto, he said, had asked the coordinating minister for people's welfare and the minister of education and culture to formulate an education system capable of turning out graduates with marketable trades.

"This is to anticipate working conditions in the 21st century. If we fail to do this we'll see intellectual unemployment," Soeharto warned, as quoted by Harmoko.

On key economic indicators, Harmoko said last month's inflation rate was 0.4 percent, compared to 0.04 percent deflation in September.

He said cumulative inflation in the first ten months of this year was 5.35 percent, compared to 7.34 percent during the same period last year.

The money supply at the end of September reached Rp 59.7 trillion (US$25.7 billion), up 12.3 percent on the end of March, he said.

Harmoko said Indonesia's trade surplus increased 56.7 percent in August to $937.9 million from $508.5 million in July. In August, total exports were valued at $4.31 billion and imports at $3.38 billion.

New projets

The cabinet meeting, Harmoko said, was also briefed on plans to build three new urea fertilizer plants in West Java, East Kalimantan and Aceh next year to meet farmers' rising demand.

The meeting was also informed of President Soeharto's upcoming visit to Rome to attend the Food Summit from Nov. 13 to Nov. 17. The summit is being organized by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization.

"Soeharto's presence will give more weight to the meeting in view of his internationally-recognized success in leading Indonesia toward rice self-sufficiency," Harmoko said. (bnt/vin)