The dawn of 2020marked as a new era for Indonesian foreign affairs, as the Indonesian government issued a new foreign policy direction shortly after Retno Marsudi re-elected as foreign minister for the second period. On its new foreign policy direction, Marsudi altering her previous policy priority to compete with global economic challenges in the new decade.
In 2015 Marsudi asserted that Indonesia top priority in foreign affairs was to maintain state sovereignty. It was demonstrated by Indonesia intensity to carried out around 129 border negotiation which resulted in significant border agreements. But now, economic diplomacy seemingly become Indonesia’s prominent foreign policy outlook.
With a sluggish economic growth in the past five years, Indonesia intentionally boost its economy through the implementation of economic diplomacy strategy. Theoretically, economic diplomacy is the government strategy to engage possible stakeholders (states or non-state actors) for the sake of national economic growth.
In the Indonesian case, economic diplomacy originally has been implemented through many initiatives during Marsudi’s first period. Economic ties with new and potential market in other regions such as South Asia, Latin America and African states have grown stronger. Also, profound bilateral cooperation was taken through comprehensive economic partnership (CEPA) mechanism, among others are Indonesia CEPA agreement with Australia, Chile and European Free Trade Association that was finally concluded in the past five years.
One of the most historical breakthrough was the achievement to hold Indonesia-Africa Forum (IAF) in 2018. It was a milestone for Indonesia footprint in African states. The dialogue has generated more than $568 million business deals and $1.3 billion business announcement only two days after the forum.
Unfortunately, we all also witnessing the plot-twist result of Indonesian economic growth. In the beginning of president Joko “Jokowi” Widodo administration, he was very confident to elevate Indonesia economy up to 7% in GDP. In fact, Indonesia economy has desperately stagnated in the number of 5%. And yet, Jokowi’s economic priority in the second terms predominantly inherited by his lack of budget infrastructure development projects. It reflects that some possible hurdles for Indonesia’s economic diplomacy are waiting to be address.
The challenge lay down in the weeds
According to Minister of Public Works and Public Housing (PUPR), Basuki Hadimuljono, reiterated that infrastructure development in 2019-2024requiring up to Rp2000 trillion budget allocation, while the state-budget only covered Rp620 trillion out of it.He added that private sectors and state-owned company are expected to patch the remaining budget through cooperation framework. This scheme is about the same of the previous National Medium-Term Development Plan (RPJMN) mechanism, stated that 36% of the development were funded by the private sectors and 22,2% were funded by state-owned company.
The problem is, Indonesia was hassles in providing economic capital for infrastructure projects. As what Prameswaran has been said, the challenge for Indonesia is not in the big picture, but lay down in the weeds. Some local investors are unable to provide assistance due to large funding requirement. Otherwise, foreign investor become the government’s main target.
However, to attract foreign investors─ it requiring radical changes in the system and circumvent possible regulatory hurdles, included stipulate legal certainty, restrain corruption and harmonizing regulations. After so many ineffective economic package policies, the omnibus billhas been offered from the government as an ultimate effort to regulate its investment environment. The bill encompassed 82 regulations and expectedly boost Indonesia GDP up to 6% in a near future. However, Indonesia’s limited experience on conducting omnibus law remain questioned.
Therefore, Jokowi inward looking foreign policy has been impeded by the ─ classical problem of─ convoluted bureaucracy, his round-the-clock slogan of “deregulation and simple bureaucracy” has not been able to realize by far, as we can see when he evokes it again in 2019 election. Having said that, Marsudi’s five-year foreign affairs plan of4+1 formula raises doubts.
Trade deficit
Another critical challenge for Indonesia’s economic diplomacy is how to conduct productive trade relations, as the country facing massive deterioration of its trade balance. In April 2019, Jokowi administration recorded the worst trade deficit in history, as the nation posted $2.5 billion trade deficit, surpassing the previous record $2.05 billion in December 2018. After some improvement in a next months, trade deficit reoccurs in November 2019 when the number slumped at $2.29 billion.
The global economic slowdown that resulted to the lower demand for Indonesian products deemed to be the causative factor of trade deficit and contributed to the slackening of Indonesia’s export absorbency. In the other side, huge imports have caused to the increasing number of trade deficit into $3.11 billion during 2019.
In addition, oil and gas exports posted as one of the most influential commodities for Indonesian trade balance fluctuation. The April and November trade deficit were among the example of how oil and gas deficit causing to the widen gap of Indonesia’s trade balance. Reversely in May 2019, Indonesia encounter trade surplus, mostly driven by a narrower trade balance in oil and gas industry. It reflects that oil and gas exports largely influence the trade balance stability.
Therefore, Indonesian trade relations are an important feature to achieve the resilience of economic diplomacy. Given its three-quarter of Indonesian exports by value were delivered to Asian countries, Indonesia’s commendable efforts to open diplomatic relations to new regional market need to encompass Indonesia’s export interests. Especially, widening a new and promising relations to other regions for oil and gas sectors, it is required as most of Indonesian exports (23%) are driven by this product.
Overall, Indonesian economic diplomacy direction depended on domestic ability to produce a healthy and competitive environment for economic activity. Similarly, government intervention to manage productive trade relations are crucial in order to escalate Indonesian economic growth.
