JAKARTA: Indonesia must optimise opportunities arising from the ongoing trade war between the United States (US) and China, Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Airlangga Hartarto
(pic) has said.
“We are in the midst of a situation which we can take advantage of… as the US has started to ban the imports of Chinese products,” he observed at the “2023 National Working Meeting on Government Internal Supervision” here on Wednesday.
He said that Indonesia has become a member of the first regional cooperation to focus on supply chain issues, namely the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF).
Other IPEF members include Brunei, Fiji, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, Australia, India, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, the Philippines, and the United States.
The IPEF member countries have committed to realising economic cooperation involving the private sector as well as implementing technical assistance and capacity-building programmes.
The collaboration is expected to increase investment in critical sectors, prominent goods, physical and digital infrastructure, transportation, as well as employment projects.
“Indonesia and the US are discussing the facilitation of Indonesian nickel products exports to the US through the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework,” the coordinating minister said.
IPEF represents more than 40 per cent of the global economy as well as 28 per cent of global trade in goods and services. It aims to develop inclusive economic cooperation among countries in the Indo-Pacific.
The trade war between the US and China started in 2018 when the 45th president of the United States, Donald Trump, decided to impose import tariffs on Chinese products, which were considered to have a detrimental effect on the sale of domestic products.
Responding to the US policy, China also imposed import tariffs on American products.
The two countries continued to gradually impose tariffs on each other, resulting in an escalated trade war.
Recently, the United States limited the trade of semiconductor and artificial intelligence technology to China citing national security.
In response, China filed a lawsuit with the World Trade Organisation (WTO) against the policy of the US.
In addition, the Chinese government allocated US$140 billion (about Rp2,092 trillion) to increase domestic chip production.
