Indonesia is interested in signing a sister-state agreement with the Tamil Nadu Government, Ambassador, Andi M. Ghalib, said on Sunday.
Talking to reporters, he said that he had planned to meet Governor and Chief Minister, expressing his country's desire to sign the sister-state agreement and explore the business and investment potential with regard to coal mining and other sectors. He would visit a coal-fired thermal power plant of Coastal Energen, the Indian arm of Coal and Oil group of Dubai, being set up in Tuticorin.
Mr. Ghalib, who is on a visit to the City, said “Tamil Nadu is very important to us. We are going to upgrade our office of Honorary Consul in Chennai into the Consulate General. We have formally sent a proposal to our government. It will be managed by eight officials.”
Tourism was also accorded highest priority in investment and business promotion. Last year, 1.80 lakh Indians visited Indonesia and it was likely to go up to 2.40 lakh this year.
Garuda would start operating direct flights from Jakarta to four Indian metros. Perhaps, the maiden flight would be to Chennai, he said.
Mentioning that the bilateral trade between the two countries have been on the upswing, he said a 50- member-strong business delegation from various parts of India would be taken to Indonesia, beginning from May 6-13. The delegation would be appraised of the scope for investment in the areas of agriculture, rubber, mining, coal, textiles, defence and information technology
According to Mr. Ghalib, the bilateral trade between the two countries touched $20 billion last month and it was growing. In January 2011 when Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono visited India, he and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh agreed to increase the volume of bilateral trade to $ 25 billion by 2015. But, in view of the spurt in trade volume, the target was now revised to $ 45 billion.
“My visit here is to explain the big opportunities available to Indian businessmen in Indonesia,” he said.
During the visit of Mr. Yudhoyono, 32 Memorandum of Understandings (MoUs) were signed, covering (Government to Government, Government to Business and Business to Business).
“If all the MoUs are implemented, it would generate additional revenue of $16 billion to our bilateral trade,” he said.
To questions on the levy of high tax rates on the coal export, the envoy said he did not receive any adverse feedback from the Indian business community. The levy did not have any impact on the trade volume.
He explained that originally, the prices of coal in his country were the lowest and the taxes were levied to make them on par with international prices.
Leonard F. Hutabarat, Indonesian Counsellor, said that the two-way trade was heavily loaded in favour of Indonesia, with the former doing a business of $11 billion and India about $9 billion. Indonesia supplied coal, wood, rubber and palm oil among other things.
India exported machinery, electronics and textiles.
