Indonesia’s Energy Outlook: Opportunities and Challenges

Sandiaga Uno shared experiences and perspective about Indonesia’s Energy Outlook

June 24, 2013, Universitas Pelita Harapan (UPH) together with Indonesia Forum Foundation (YIF) arranged a seminar entitled ?Indonesia’s Energy Outlook: Opportunities and Challenges?, to address the condition of Indonesia, which is still struggling to meet domestic demand. This is because of the reduction and limitation in the production of oil and gas due to the increasing energy consumption in Indonesia by 50% in the last 10 years. Taking place in Siloam MRCCC conference room, the seminar was attended by more than 100 participants from various backgrounds, such as Embassy, expert and professionals, entrepreneurs and many more.

Sandiaga Uno, founder of Saratoga Investama Sedaya, Chairman of Indonesia Forum Foundation and member of the National Economic Committee (KEN) became the keynote speaker in this seminar. There are also 3 speakers in this seminar representing various backgrounds, namely Dr. Herman Darnel Ibrahim (National Energy Council of The Republic of Indonesia), Mr. Hasto Kristijono (President Director of P.T. Sumberdaya Sewatama) and Ms. Elvi Nasution (Executive Director of Natixis Bank).

Mr. Sandiaga Uno opened this seminar with his keynote speech by sharing his experience in opening a company on energy field. In opening one company, he has to go through at least four ministries in order to get the license. Therefore, he expected Indonesian government to reform their bureaucracy to trigger stakeholders? interest in building and develop energy sector in Indonesia. Optimistic with the development of the energy sector, he said that Indonesia still had many natural resources that could be used as energy like coal, moreover, Indonesia itself is one of the leading exporters in coal. Dr. Herman supported Sandiaga Uno by saying that Indonesia?s energy consumption is still categorized as low and even below the world average. The slow process of Indonesia?s development in energy conversion might be the cause for this problem. For example, Dr. Herman stated his disappointment when he worked at PLN; he visited China and saw that China could build 10 power plants, whereas Indonesia has not completed even one power plant yet. However, Dr. Herman expressed his optimism on this issue because in recent years Indonesia has grown rapidly in terms of economic.

On the other hand, Mr. Hasto discussed this issue from industry perspectives. He said that the new capacity building was slow to catch-up because it was overwhelmed by structural and technical problems. Meanwhile, Ms. Elvi?s discussion was more focused in the investment requirement in the energy sector. As a person working in financial sector, she believes that energy sector development typically requires a huge project financing.

The seminar then continued with question and answer session. Many questions rose regarding the fuel subsidy cut off that happened recently. Mr. Sandiaga Uno in particular supports this policy, even though he added that this kind of issue is somehow related to the political agenda in most of the times. He also believes that this policy will be challenging, however according to him, a leader has the capacity to make tough and difficult decision, and thus he wished that Indonesia people could support this policy. (fm)