Indonesia closely watches 3 factors to preserve growth: minister

JAKARTA, Aug. 8 (Xinhua) -- An Indonesian minister said on Wednesday that the government aims to preserve growth by closely watching three factors including investment rates, domestic economy and infrastructure project.

Indonesian economy has reached an unexpected level of 6.4 percent in the second quarter this year amid the ongoing economy difficulties, said Indonesian Coordinating Economy Minister Hatta Radjasa.

The first factor is the high investment rates, emphasizing that it's the time for the government to encourage the usage of domestic materials in the production process, and this measure would reduce the country's import, he said.

"The exaggerating import would increase our term of payment," the minister said.

The second factor is the domestic economy that should be preserved. He said that high domestic demands are still dominating factors that spur national economic growth.

"It should be preserved by aligning it with our industry growth. It should also be expansive in order to eliminate the hindrance," he added.

He said the domestic economy is closely related to inflation that can easily be affected by price fluctuation of goods and services in the market. The two factors, domestic economy and inflation, need to be closely watched simultaneously, he added.

The minister added that the third factor is the infrastructure project. He said that there has to be an integrated and orchestrated efforts to provide for infrastructure in facilitating the investments.

Infrastructure issue has been a crucial problem faced by Indonesia as it has insufficient infrastructure to accommodate investors interesting to run their investments in several areas across the country.

Government has endorsed a program aimed at accelerating infrastructure development (MP3EI) across the country earlier this year.