JAKARTA, THE NUSANTARA POST- The Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment (Menko Marves) Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan added that the improving situation of the COVID-19 pandemic has triggered the acceleration of economic recovery in the country.
“Although it had declined, Indonesia’s economic recovery was able to rise quickly and showed a very positive trend since the end of February,” said Luhut in a statement after the Limited Meeting (Ratas) on the Evaluation of Community Activity Restrictions (PPKM) chaired by Indonesian President Joko Widodo ( Jokowi), Monday (4/04/2022), at the Merdeka Palace, Jakarta.
The recovery, Luhut continued, could be seen from, among other things, increasing the public spending index.
“This can be seen from the spending index from the Mandiri Institute which has increased again in all regions, even the Bali and Nusa Tenggara regions have reached their highest levels since the pandemic hit,” he said.
As the pandemic situation improves, people’s activities and mobility have also increased significantly, even reaching the highest level since the pandemic in Indonesia.
“This explains that the conditions and situation of the pandemic in Indonesia are not controlled very well which ultimately creates a sense of security and comfort in our society to carry out activities,” he said.
Not only community activity, activity in the industrial sector also continued to improve and recorded positive growth for seven consecutive months. This increase in activity, said Luhut, has an impact on increasing employment in the manufacturing sector.
With the pandemic uncontrolled in the country, Luhut continued, the government has carried out a number of community activities and is preparing to make the transition from pandemic to endemic. Based on global normality index data released by The Economist magazine, Indonesia is at 68 out of 100 as a normal condition.
“One thing we still have to improve is the international flight capacity which is still far from normal. For that, the government will take steps, including opening international airports including Yogyakarta, Medan, Makassar, Pekanbaru,” he said.
In addition, the Coordinating Minister for Marvels added, the visa policy will continue to be relaxed closer to the rules before the pandemic. Easing will also be carried out for foreign travel actors (PPLN).
“We will also relax the PPLN test rules for entering Indonesia so that the number of incoming flights can increase without causing a buildup at the airport. Details regarding this will be stated in the Task Force Circular (Covid-19 Handling) which will be issued soon,” he said.
The Development of the Pandemic Situation
Regarding the development of the pandemic situation in the country, Luhut said that daily cases of COVID-19 had decreased sharply by up to 97 percent compared to the peak of cases of the Omicron variant.
“Active cases nationally have also decreased by 83 percent from the peak of cases (Omicron) last year, so that now it is below 100 thousand active cases,” he said.
Then, the number of treatments for COVID-19 patients in hospitals decreased to 85 percent and the bed occupancy rate (BOR) was at a low level of six percent. The number of patients who died also dropped dramatically to 88 percent compared to the peak of Omicron cases.
“From the data above, we draw the conclusion that the condition of the Omicron variant in Indonesia is currently in a controlled position,” he said.
For the Java-Bali region, Luhut continued, it also continued to experience a very significant decline in all aspects, such as confirmed cases, hospitalizations, and death rates. The decline in the trend of COVID-19 cases also affected the district/city assessment level in Java-Bali.
“Currently there are no more regencies/cities at level 4. As many as 93 percent of regencies/cities in Java and Bali are already at levels 1 and 2, only nine regencies/cities are still at level 3,” he concluded ( wan)
