He listed several economic indicators that he believes will continue to move positively, including the Consumer Confidence Index (IKK), which increased to 124.4 in August 2024 from 123.4 the previous month.
Indonesia's foreign exchange reserves also swelled to USD150.2 billion at the end of August from USD145.4 billion at the end of July.
"If the economy does not move, foreign exchange reserves will not increase. Moreover, we have just issued regulations on export proceeds (DHE), which have proven to be able to maintain the number of dollars in the country," he said.
Furthermore, the rupiah has been successfully suppressed to the level of Rp15,300 after previously breaching Rp16 thousand.
"So, that proves that the economy is moving," the minister added.
Regarding inflation, although the monthly performance recorded a deflation of 0.12 percent as of September, the core component still experienced inflation of 0.16 percent.
Referring to Bank Indonesia (BI) data, core inflation is a component of inflation that tends to be stable in its movement.
Core inflation is influenced by a number of factors, including demand-supply interactions; the external environment in the form of exchange rates, international commodity prices, and global economic developments; as well as expectations of future inflation.
According to Hartarto, core inflation is a more important component to pay attention to compared to overall inflation.
"If core inflation continues to rise, it is in line with economic growth. Because it is an anomaly if growth increases, but core inflation falls," he explained.
Even looking at overall inflation, Indonesia has succeeded in suppressing the inflation rate in the last 10 years, he added.
In 2014, national inflation was recorded at 8.36 percent. Meanwhile, this year, annual inflation reached 1.84 percent year on year and calendar year inflation was recorded at 0.74 percent year to date as of September.
"So, we are not worried about that (deflation), because we also see other indicators of the economy (comprehensively)," he said.
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Translator: Imamatul Silfia, Yashinta Difa
Editor: Rahmad Nasution
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