“Indonesia needs to minimize policies that could potentially violate international commitments,” Imam said in Jakarta on Tuesday as quoted by kompas.com.

He said to face competition in the global market, Indonesia prioritized a positive approach and engagement through bilateral consultation, and preferred to stay away from trade wars that could lead to tension with other countries.

Through such an approach, Indonesia is expected to boost its exports and slow down imports by improving the competitiveness of Indonesian products and commodities.

Indonesia and other emerging economies have become victims of the trade war between the United States and China, each of which has introduced high tariffs to prevent inflows of imports from the other country.

“Accelerating efforts to strengthen the competitiveness of our products will help us improve the balance of our exports and imports,” he added.

He said that market diversification was also being afforded by the government to reduce the dependency on the traditional market. He added that the government was eyeing a number of African countries as potential new markets for Indonesia.

“We want to diversify our markets for goods and services. We don’t want to rely only on large markets like Japan and the US,” he added. (bbn)

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