The Coordinating Minister for the Economy Airlangga Hartarto said that the Export Proceeds (DHE) policy which was held for three months could generate foreign exchange reserves of up to US$50 billion a year.
"So export proceeds are required to be held for three months in Indonesia, around 30 percent are withheld. From there, our calculations show we can save around US$40 to US$50 billion in one year," said Airlangga in the Economic Outlook 2023 webinar in Jakarta, quoted from Antara, Tuesday (14/2).
Currently, the government is working on regulations regarding the 30 percent DHE obligation of a company to be detained in Indonesia for three months.
According to him, similar policies have also been implemented by Malaysia, Thailand and Turkey which hold DHE in their countries even for up to one year, or exchanged into local currency.
"The government through the Ministry of Finance, Bank Indonesia and the Financial Services Authority (OJK) is processing incentives so that the foreign exchange deposit facilities provided by Indonesia are the same as Singapore," he said.
With this policy, he hopes that banks will have sufficient foreign exchange to support government foreign debt repayments that mature this year.
"The government also needs to anticipate foreign exchange reserves because inflation in the United States this year has not been controlled so there is potential for them to raise the benchmark interest rate again," he said.
In January 2023, Bank Indonesia recorded foreign exchange reserves reaching US$139.4 billion, an increase compared to November 2022's position of US$137.2 billion.
The position of foreign exchange reserves is equivalent to financing 6.1 months of imports and servicing the government's foreign debt, and is above the international adequacy standard of around three months of imports.
