President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has promised to further ease licensing procedures to ensure that businesses will be able to obtain permits within 50 working days.
"Business licensing is still a complicated issue. Previously, it took 151 days, but then we cut it to 97 days. Now, it needs to be reduced to a maximum of 50 days in all local government areas. Don't complicate things unnecessarily," Yudhoyono said when opening the national congress of the Young Indonesian Business Association (HIPMI) in Semarang, Central Java, on Tuesday evening.
During the event, which was also attended by House of Representatives Speaker Agung Laksono, Coordinating Minister for the Economy Boediono, and Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry chairman Mohammad S. Hidayat, the President also urged regional administrations to refrain from issuing regulations that could stymie investment.
"The government has thus far annulled 750 ordinances as they conflicted with central government policies," Yudhoyono said.
The President urged local authorities to provide tax incentives to attract investors to the regions, and thereby create more jobs, increase local revenues and alleviate poverty.
He also urged businesspeople to put their money in prospective sectors, such as energy, transportation, property, infrastructure, telecommunications, banking and manufacturing.
For example, he pointed out that the food processing industry offered enormous prospects given Indonesia's large market of 220 million people.
He added that steadily increasing purchasing power made food processing even more attractive.
The President concluded by saying that he had asked the central bank to further cut its key interest rate and to keep the lid on inflation at around 6.6 percent.
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