AIMING FOR RECOVERY

THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC has plunged most countries into recession in 2020, with per capita income contracting in the largest fraction of countries globally since 1870.

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Indonesia is no exception. GDP growth in the third quarter slumped to -3.49% with full-year expectation at -1.5% according to the IMF. The Jakarta Composite Index hit its lowest level in March at 3,937.632 from 6,283.581 at the beginning of the year. Despite lingering fear and uncertainty, many see that the worst may already be behind us. Now, governments around the world are making new initiatives and taking unconventional measures to deal with the situation, which hopefully lead to a faster recovery.

The Indonesian government, for example, has signed a burden-sharing agreement with its central bank, Bank Indonesia, to anticipate budget deficit concern. The elephant in the room is of course the newly issued omnibus law. Despite provoking wide protests and rejection, the government expects it to attract foreign investors as soon as the path to global recovery becomes more certain. Meanwhile, some entrepreneurs and startups are taking advantage of new opportunities rising from the shifing people’s behavior resulting from the pandemic. COVID-19 can be seen as the catalyst for many growth stories as technology adoption, e-commerce expansion, health tech, and edutech have all seen increased demands as a result of the pandemic; many of these areas being among the most popular sectors for venture capital investors.

For this year’s outlook edition, Forbes Indonesia invited Andry Asmoro, chief economist of Bank Mandiri; Harry Su, managing director and head of equity capital markets at Samuel Sekuritas; and Willson Cuaca, co-founder and managing partner of East Ventures, to share their thoughts on what may lay ahead. And unlike the previous years, where we held the roundtable discussion over lunch, this year the conversation was done online. Here is the edited excerpt of the interview: