The Jakarta Post reported that under President Mr Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's watch, the total capital expenditure of state firms reached IDR 128 trillion, nearly a 400% increase compared to the previous government leadership and is expected to continue growing.
Mr Sofyan Djalil state minister for state enterprises said that "State enterprises have played an important role in the national economy in the last five years. They no longer burden the government as they used to. They are now capable of competing with private companies."
In a review of state firms' performance during the 5 year term, the state ministry for state enterprises concluded that most firms had managed to increase investment as demanded by shareholders. The review shows that the total value of assets held by state firms jumped by 166% from IDR 1,192 trillion in 2004 to IDR 1,978 trillion by the end of 2008, revenues by 220% to IDR 1,162 trillion within the same period and net profit by 212% to IDR 78.47 trillion.
Mr Sofyan said that the positive performance above was largely the result of cumulative earning increases in 5 sectors namely, 384% in the plantation industry, 260% in the mining industry, 200% in the transportation industry, 61% in the telecommunications industry and 10% in the banking sector.
He predicted that the mining and plantation sectors would grow faster as a result of better commodity prices, while other sectors such as construction, transportation and banking would also benefit from favorable macroeconomic conditions following an improvement in the global economy.
Other state firms in the fisheries, paper, printing and publication industries will not enjoy a similar growth for various reasons, he said, without elaborating further. The review also shows that 23 out of 141 state enterprises suffered losses within the five year period, down from 35 firms in the previous period. The total value of losses more than doubled from IDR 6.83 trillion by the end of 2004 to IDR 14 trillion in 2008, with state power producer PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara contributing losses of IDR 12.3 trillion.
State firms expected to enter the bourse within the near future include Bank Tabungan Negara, PT Pembangunan Perumahan, Garuda Indonesia and PT Krakatau. The ministry also aims to make state firms more efficient by creating holding companies for firms operating in similar industries and reducing the total number of firms the government has a stake in to 89.
Mr Said Didu secretary to the state minister said that "We will coordinate with the directorate general of taxation about this unpaid tax. We hope the directorate general will give us some information about the companies so we can act accordingly."
(Sourced from www.thejakartapost.com)
