VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Jakarta. A Finance Ministry official has projected that Indonesia's economy will grow by around 7-8 percent in the second quarter of this year as recovery picks up pace.

"In the second quarter, we believe that if the rhythm and trend of improvement in COVID-19 continues, recovery can be accelerated to growth of 7 percent to 8 percent," said head of the Macro Policy Center for the Fiscal Policy Agency at the ministry, Hidayat Amir.

He made the remarks at a webinar on Indonesia Macroeconomic Update 2021, which he joined from Jakarta on Thursday.

The projected growth at this level is still realistic considering that Indonesia had a low base in the second quarter of last year, namely minus 5.3 percent, he explained.

Not only that, various indicators of economic growth, such as cement and motor vehicle sales, are also seen starting to increase after being suppressed by the impact of the extraordinary pandemic last year, he pointed out.

"Hopefully, several emerging indicators such as cement and motor vehicle sales can become leading indicators," he remarked.

He assured that his agency would continue to monitor developments in the economic indicators as well as expedite efforts to deal with COVID-19.

Amir also predicted that Indonesia's economy for the first quarter of this year will still be in a contraction zone of around minus 1.1 percent to minus 0.1 percent.

"It is possible to approach the lower level, but we will see some indicators continue to improve. We will continue to monitor this change,” he said. (Antaranews)