PRESIDENT CALLS FOR ACTION PLANS TO FACE ECONOMIC CRISIS

Jakarta, Dec 11 (ANTARA) - President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono called on his ministers to prepare action plans in anticipation of the impact of the global financial crisis on the national economy.
The president made the call on his economic ministers who attended a limited cabinet meeting at the Presidential Office here on Thursday, according to Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati.
She said the action plans constituted concrete steps that had to be taken by ministers to anticipate the impact of the global crisis on the national economy, particularly the real sector.
"The president asked us to prepare action plans which actually constitute derivatives of what the ministers are going to do at the concrete level with the real sector," Mulyani said.
The real sector is a sector which will be worst affected by the economic crunch as a result of the global financial crisis so that the ministers were asked to prepare action plans in accordance with their respective field.
World economic growth, including that of the United States, Japan and European countries, is predicted to continue to drop until the second quarter of 2009.
Therefore, the finance minister said, Indonesia needed to take anticipatory steps in order to face the negative impact of the economic meltdown.
"There are several matters that we have to continue paying attention to and monitoring. Of most importance to do managing the crisis is to increase the ability to response and to act with flexibilities," she said.
The limited cabinet meeting which was chaired by the president, was attended by Vice President Jusuf Kalla and number of economic ministers.
Mulyani said that meeting discussed on-going infrastructure projects and those that the government was going to build.
She said that the government decided to accelerate the implementation of infrastructure projects in order to anticipate the increase in the number of unemployed people laid off due to the financial crisis.
"The discussion today concerned infrastructure projects which have been and will be carried out by the government in 2009," she said.