Corona Effect! Economic Experts Said the Number of Poor People in Indonesia Will Increase Drastically

News24xx.com - The potential for increasing the number of poverty in Java due to Corona is very large compared to other regions. Director of the Special Transfer Fund of the Directorate General of Fiscal Balance (DJPK) of the Ministry of Finance, Putut Hari Satyaka said that the biggest increase in poverty was in Java because the region was the epicenter of the spread of COVID-19.

Putut also explained, the potential increase in the number of poverty is the impact of disruption of national economic activity, plus the government implements large-scale social restrictions (PSBB) in all sectors that support the economy.

The Indonesian government puts economic growth in an optimistic scenario of between minus 0.4% to 2.3%. The Ministry of Finance itself is conducting a heavy scenario study in the hope that growth will be at the level of 2.3%, while the very heavy scenario is minus 0.4% until the end of 2020.

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From that scenario, it is seen that there was a decline in the target of economic growth from initially 5.3% according to the 2020 State Budget. That way, the potential social impact of reducing growth on poverty, Putut said for a heavy scenario, would increase by around 1.16 million people, very heavy 3, 78 million people.

Likewise in the unemployment rate, in a heavy scenario, it will increase by about 2.92 million people, and very heavy around 5.23 million people. Specifically for the potential increase in poverty, Putut said that Java was the biggest compared to other regions.

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To anticipate this impact, Putut revealed that policy breakthroughs were needed, one of which was through transfers to the regions and village funds (TKDD) in handling COVID-19. Among others, adjustments to the allocation of TKDD through Perpres 54 of 2020 to be diverted to the handling of Corona centrally.

"The government has worked with various draft strategies and policies, and one related to fiscal policy is the budget for health, health care, handling COVID. Social aid (Bansos) hundreds of trillions, handling the protection of purchasing power of hundreds of trillions," he said.