JAKARTA, Oct 13 (NNN-ANTARA) – The Indonesian economy began to recover in the third quarter, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, after the government allocated budget for health, social assistance and small and medium enterprises, a minister said Monday.
The Indonesian economy was expected to recover in the third quarter and grow stronger in this quarter, Finance Minister, Sri Mulyani Indrawati said, in a virtual financial profession event.
According to Indrawati, the Indonesian economic growth in the third quarter was still projected to be in the negative range, but it was expected to improve after it contracted 5.32 percent in the second quarter this year.
At a press conference on the state budget on Sept 22, the minister predicted the country’s economic growth in the third quarter would contract about 2.8 percent to one percent. As a whole this year, the Indonesian economy contracted between 0.6 percent and 1.7 percent.
The projection is in line with those made by the International Monetary Fund, which predicted that the Indonesian economy would grow minus 0.3 percent in 2020.
The World Bank projected that the Indonesian economic growth would contract between two percent and 1.6 percent and the Asian Development Bank said, the economic growth in the country would contract by one percent this year.
The Indonesian government has set a budget of 695.2 trillion rupiahs (some 47.1 billion U.S. dollars) for COVID-19 mitigation and national economic recovery, making the 2020 budget deficit widen to 6.34 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP).– NNN-ANTARA
