VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Tongging Village in Merek District, Karo Regency, North Sumatra, which is located in the Lake Toba area, was developed as a culinary and shopping destination.
Virginia Kadarsan Ministry of Tourism and Shopping Acceleration Development Team during the Focus Group Discussion (FGD) Understanding of Culinary Tourism and Shopping Development held a week ago on Brastagi, North Sumatra, said there were many advantages if culinary and shopping tourism was developed faster in the Lake Toba Region.

"Because, there is a big business value that can be obtained from there. These two types of tours are very competitive to bring in a large income, "Virginia said.

Tongging village is located about 1 hour from Brastagi and sticks directly to Lake Toba against the background of Mount Sipiso-Piso. Here also found Sipiso-Piso Waterfall. Its position is at an elevation of 800 meters above sea level, then has a height of 120 meters.

Another activity is trekking in the viewing post area. This area is very interesting with a winding route.

Virginia added, the follow-up to the development of culinary tourism and shopping will have a positive impact on Lake Toba.

Virginia also explained the need to intervene stakeholders around the Lake Toba area to realize it, starting from the Lake Toba Authority Implementing Agency (BPODT) to the community and tourism industry players.
"Strong commitment from all stakeholders has been obtained. BPODT finally agreed to use Tongging as its initial project. Tongging will be used as the initial identification and development of Wiskulja. In addition to its position, this region has great potential, "he said.

Separately, Oneng Setya Harini, Assistant Deputy for the Development of Kemenpar Culture Tourism, added culinary tourism and shopping became a big income for the development of the creative economy. In 2017, culinary provides income of up to 41.69 percent.

While tourism shopping contributed up to 33.85 percent. Interestingly, creative economic growth rose 4.95 percent in 2016. Its distribution to National GDP was 7.39 percent to 7.44 percent in the range 2014-2016.

"The acceleration of Wiskulja development in the Lake Toba area must be done. The hope, of course, is that this destination will be more optimal in providing economic value. The potential can be distributed optimally, "he said.

While heading to the next stage, understanding the Wiskulja concept must be held by tourism stakeholders in Karo and North Sumatra. According to Oneng, the concept of gastronomic development in Indonesia is influenced by 3 elements. These triangles are culinary, cultural and historical. Its derivative factors consist of rituals, spices, and storytelling. (kemenpar) 

Business conditions faced by Indonesia's manufacturing industry continued to improve in the middle of the second quarter of 2019. The driver of the increase was stronger expansion in output and growth in new demand.

This was reflected in the Indonesian manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index ™ (PMI ™) data released by the Nikkei which showed that Indonesia's manufacturing PMI in May this year was 51.6, up from the previous month at 50.4.

The PMI points above the 50 mark indicate that the manufacturing sector is expanding. The achievements in May 2019 are the highest since August 2018. In the period of May, the confidence of Indonesian manufacturers continued to surge, companies also increased the number of workers, and increased purchasing activities.

"We see, manufacturing industry players are still optimistic about expanding or increasing investment. This is supported by stable and conducive political, economic and security conditions in Indonesia, especially after yesterday's election, "said Minister of Industry Airlangga Hartarto in Jakarta, Sunday (2/6).

The Minister of Industry is optimistic, the performance of the manufacturing industry is increasingly stretching. "Moreover, the transportation infrastructure is increasing rapidly with the connectivity of the eastern and western regions of Java, as well as several regions that are feeders and hubs in Indonesia," he explained.

Then, another potential is the experience of industrialization in Indonesia which is more than 30 years so that it has a pool of talent for the leading sector. "In order to boost industrial performance, the government also prioritizes vocational education and polytechnics by introducing a link and match system to reform the curriculum," he added.

In order to spur investment in the industrial sector, the Ministry of Industry also facilitated a number of polytechnic developments in industrial estates. This strategic step is to create competent human resources (HR) that meet the needs of today's industry. "We have built a polytechnic, including in the Cilegon, Morowali and Kendal industrial areas," said the Minister of Industry.

Furthermore, the Ministry of Industry has proposed the provision of fiscal incentives in the form of super deductible tax for industries that actively carry out research and development activities to generate innovation and industries involved in vocational education and training programs. This fiscal incentive is believed to be able to attract investors in the industrial sector while boosting its competitiveness.

Responding to data from the Indonesian PMI Manufacturing survey in May 2019, IHS Markit Chief Economist Bernard Aw said that Indonesia's manufacturing sector growth in May was a momentum to gather optimism towards the second quarter of this year. "The increasingly strong demand conditions have pushed the company to continue to increase production in the coming months," he explained.

This continued increase, according to him, will also increase confidence among manufacturing industries in Indonesia. "We see, the future output index, a benchmark for business expectations, jumped to its highest position for more than two years, becoming the highest monthly increase (15.6 points) recorded in the survey history," he explained.

Pegatron investment

The Minister of Industry added, one of the manufacturing sectors that is increasingly aggressive in investing in Indonesia, namely the electronics industry. For example, an electronics company from Taiwan, Pegatron cooperates with the national electronics industry in Batam to produce wifi components and equipment that have been exported to the United States.

"They said that they would increase the number of their production and produce other electronic products in a cooperative capacity with Satnusa. In addition, they are also looking for new investment locations. Besides in Batam, they also consider East Java, "said Minister of Industry.

In addition, Airlangga said, there were several industries from China that would relocate their factories to Southeast Asia, including Indonesia, which was the main destination. "There are textile, garment and footwear companies that are looking at new locations in Indonesia. Besides that, there are also chemical and biochemical industries and the automotive industry, "he said.

These sectors are industries that are getting priority development by the Indonesian government to be more competitive globally, because they are export-oriented, labor intensive, and become import substitutions. Based on the map of Making Indonesia 4.0, these industries will also be a pioneer sector in implementing 4.0 industry in the country.

"At present it shows intense competition between Asian countries which are competing to benefit from the US-China trade war by making their countries attractive to foreign investment," he said.

Director of Industrial Area Directorate General of Resilience, Regional and International Industrial Access (KPAII) Ministry of Industry (kemenperin) 

The Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) reported that an earthquake, measuring 6.0 on the Richter scale, hit South Nias in North Sumatra Province on Monday afternoon.

The epicenter of the quake that hit at 12:57 West Indonesia Standard Time (WIB) was located at sea, 30 kilometers southwest of South Nias, at a depth of 19 kilometers, the BMKG stated on its twitter account @infoBMKG.

According to the BMKG, the tremor was felt as far as Teluk Dalam, Gunung Sitoli, Padang Siempuan, and North Nias.

The agency also confirmed that the quake was followed by a 5.5-magnitude aftershock, centered 40 kilometers southwest of South Nias.

No immediate report of casualties or material damage was received. (ant) 

​​​​​​The Indonesian government is ready to increase the export of cacao and its derivative products to European Union (EU) countries.

"One of the leading commodities that has seen an increasing demand is chocolate, or cocoa. (Thus) Indonesia is committed to increasing the volume of cacao exports and its quality, along with sustainable derivative products," Indonesian Agricultural Attache for Belgium Wahida said on Sunday.

Indonesia's trade balance for cacao products and derivatives always shows a positive trend from year to year.

The value of Indonesian cacao exports to the EU in 2018 reached US$215.2 million, an increase of 22 percent compared to 2017 with US$201.7 million.

This figure is only one percent of the total import value of the EU for cacao products and its derivatives, which has reached US$27.4 billion.

The largest cacao importing countries to the EU are Ivory Coast (US$4 billion), Ghana (US$1.5 billion) and Nigeria (US$672 million). Based on data reported by Eurostat, the EU is the largest cacao consumer in the world, at 8-9 kilogram annually per capita.

According to the Indonesian Embassy's Trade Attache in Brussels, Merry Astrid Indriasari, securing access to strategic commodity markets through tariff liberalization is key in the Indonesia-EU Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (IEU-CEPA) negotiations.

Such effort can also increase the exports of cacao and its derivative products to the EU market. Until now, Indonesia has proposed an initial offer for more than 10,000 tariff posts, including cocoa and its derivative products.

"We hope this can accelerate the negotiation process to catch up with other ASEAN countries that already have FTAs with the EU," Astrid said.

On the other hand, the demand for cacao beans in the country is also increasing. In addition to exporting cacao beans, currently the cocoa processing industry for re-exports is developing within Indonesia.

For the record, in 2018 Indonesia imported 240,000 tons of cacao beans, with an import value of US$ 528 million. The supply of available national cacao beans is still not able to meet the installed capacity of the cacao processing industry.

"Cacao processing plants process cacao beans into semi-finished goods to be exported to major consumer countries, such as Europe, the United States and Japan," Wahida said.

Cacao butter remains Indonesia's leading export product, with export volumes reaching 24,600 tons in 2018.(ant)