Indonesia agrees to resolve bottlenecks to Indian investments

Indonesia on Friday agreed to address the concerns of Indian companies investing here and is willing to set up a joint high-level task force in this regard.

Indian companies have made some big investments in Indonesia in sectors like coal, mining and infrastructure. However, some of them have been facing some problems.  During their extensive meetings with Indonesian counterparts, visiting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other senior leaders and officials today raised these issues and these matters were received positively by their Indonesian counterparts.  A number of Indian power companies have been looking at Indonesia for coal imports due to problems in the sector back home.  Briefing the media after these meetings, top officials said that Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono told the Indian Prime Minister that these issues would be addressed suitably.  "There are some issues regarding the investments by Indian companies in Indonesia and the President agreed that a joint high level task force will be set up to look into these issues," a top official said.  This will help in boosting two-way investments between the two countries, he added.  Explaining this further, officials said that some Indian companies have made big investments into Indonesia in sectors like coal mining and these are very critical to power projects in India.  They said that the experiences of Indian investors have been mixed, as progress of investments in some areas has been very good and slow for some others.  There are some regulatory issues here in the coal mining sector, while there are also problems related to international pricing, an official said, adding that what Indian companies want are a stable and predictable business regime on issues like regulations and pricing.  They expressed the hope that the new task force would resolve these concerns and help further expand Indian investments into Indonesia.