Business actors continue to promote caution and vigilance even though they claim to be optimistic about economic conditions in 2023. Deputy Chairperson for Industry of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) Bobby Gafur Umar revealed several things that need to be watched out for this year, especially related to solid industries creation. "When asked to be optimistic, we are optimistic, but we have to be careful of several factors, especially those related to labor-intensive and export markets, such as TPT [Textiles and Textile Products] and furniture because the market is shrinking," he said, Sunday (1/1/ 2023).

During 2022, he continued, many industries have prepared for expansion, but due to a decrease in demand, many of these companies are trying to make efficiency and optimize existing capacity.

Bobby also emphasized that currently entrepreneurs have not been able to determine the full 2023 business projection, because they need to see conditions in the upcoming first quarter/2023.

"We see that we have just passed 2022 and the Indonesian economy is still in quite good condition and the government's steps are correct, but we have to see developments in the first quarter, how can we not predict too much in 2023 what the economy will be like because the world is still in trouble," he added.

Bobby believes that the ones with great potential are the domestic market and MSMEs, which are driving and supporting the Indonesian economy. To maintain it all, Bobby hopes that the government will not raise the benchmark interest rate to maintain liquidity so that the economy can continue to improve. The reason is that in the last 5 months, the trend of BI's benchmark interest rate has continued to rise.

BI has raised its benchmark interest rate since August until this month in a row to 5.50 percent. Finally, said Bobby, Jokowi's decision to abolish the Implementation of Restricting Community Activities (PPKM) so that the economy can run normally.

In line with Bobby, Anton J. Supit, Chair of the Employment Division of the Indonesian Employers' Association, said that with the abolition of PPKM, the current economy can run normally, but we need to be careful with the potential presence of Covid-19 again because China is still struggling for this.

"Even though it has been abolished, this government still has potential in China, it still has the potential for Covid-19, therefore on the one hand we feel freer, but we need community discipline," he explained, Sunday (1/1/2023).