RI, UK will build partnerships in four areas

JAKARTA. The Indonesian and UK governments will develop partnerships in four areas to accelerate economic development in Indonesia.

“Many inputs were provided by the UK that could hopefully contribute to our development,” said Coordinating Economic Minister Hatta Rajasa in a press conference with the visiting Duke of York, Prince Andrew, in Jakarta on Wednesday.

The four areas are infrastructure, food security, energy and manufacturing.

“Infrastructure, in terms of connectivity, is very important to increase the quality of our services. There has been a lot of talk among international airports about departure delays at our airports,” said Hatta.

He said that during the meeting Indonesia unveiled a proposal for airport expansions to accommodate more than 60 million passengers with a passenger growth of 10 percent per year.

On food security, Hatta said Indonesia would increase domestic consumption capacity to reduce dependency on imports.

“Prince Andrew has promised that he will help focus on agricultural technology to help Indonesia increase productivity and thus boost production without adding new fields,” he said.

In the field of energy, the two nations will cooperate to increase Indonesia's renewable energy use, such as solar, wind and geothermal power, on small islands.

“If we develop power plants on big islands, such as Java, it would be very expensive to distribute the energy produced to small islands,” Hatta said.

He added the two countries would also partner on manufacturing, so as to help reduce Indonesia’s dependency on imported raw materials.

Prince Andrew said that so far UK-Indonesia partnerships had been fruitful.