Jokowi to Economists, Business People: Next Year Global Economy to Decline

In his remarks, Jokowi revealed that he had met with several global economic institutions such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

The meeting discussed the global economic conditions and economic condition projections for 2017. According to Jokowi, the three institutions are still pessimistic that the economic conditions next year will be better than this year.

"Everyone remains pessimistic that global economic growth will improve next year, and they even said that there will be another decline. I think this is bad news," Jokowi said at the State Palace, Thursday (9/22/2016).

Even so, Jokowi is still optimistic that next year Indonesia will still be able to grow. Jokowi's confidence emerged when he saw the optimistic attitude of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, during the G-20 meeting in Hangzhou, China on 4-5 September 2016.

"During the G-20 meeting yesterday, the most optimistic person I saw was Narendra Modi, who was still optimistic that it will improve again. I want to pick up on his point, if India dares to be optimistic, why can't we?" said Jokowi.

According to Jokowi, this optimistic attitude must still be balanced by improvements domestically.

"We need to make some big changes. If we don't, I'm sure we will be left behind," said Jokowi. (hns/dna)

M Iqbal - detik