Speaking at Bandung Indonesian University of Education (UPI) after dedicating the Creative Entrepreneurship Development and Research Center at Priangan Timur, Hatta said Indonesia requires at least 2 percent of its population to become entrepreneurs to support the country`s economic development.
According to Hatta, currently the number of entrepreneurs in Indonesia was about 1.56 percent of the total population, while the ideal number was at least 2 percent, or around 4 million people.
"Two percent is actually at the lower limit, and we already missed out from having fewer than our neighbor country, Malaysia, whose number of entrepreneurs is over 7 percent of its population," Hatta said.
He noted that the number of entrepreneurs in a country was the decisive factor in the success of its development.
Therefore, the minister said the government, during the first half of 2012, would make a shift in the orientation of its economic growth from consumption to improvement in investments.
"With the improvement of investments, the government wants to create more business activities," he said, adding that Indonesia should not lose the momentum of a demographic composition which, in the next 30 years, the majority of its population would reach their productive age. (*)
Editor: Aditia Maruli Radja
Copyright © ANTARA 2012
