As part of the Road to Launching and First Meeting of the ASEAN Treasury Forum (ATF) 2024, the Directorate General of Treasury held a series of thematic focus group discussions (FGDs). The series of FGDs were held from Tuesday (20/08) to Friday (06/09) involving all Regional Offices of the Directorate General of Treasury. The purpose of holding these thematic FGDs is to build awareness and synergy among the Heads of Regional Treasury Offices of the Directorate General of Treasury (DJPb) and to obtain input on strategic treasury issues that will be discussed in the Technical Level Discussion with other ASEAN countries.
"In line with the vision of becoming a world-class treasury manager, the Directorate General of Treasury has in recent years established cooperation to improve treasury capacity and public finance management with several countries in the ASEAN region and international financial institutions. I hope the existence of ATF will be a very good opportunity for DJPb employees to learn from each other about the treasury management practices of other ASEAN countries. Certainly, through ATF, there will be a lot of knowledge sharing among ASEAN countries," this statement explained by Sulaimansyah, the Director of Treasury Systems, in his remarks at the first thematic FGD, which raised the theme of Public Expenditure Management.
At the forum, the Director of Budget Execution, Tri Budhianto, presented a strategic treasury issue related to public expenditure management which is the main focus in supporting social protection programs in ASEAN countries. Despite Indonesia's achievements in managing social protection, the Director of Budget Execution revealed that there are still challenges in public expenditure management, particularly in accurately targeting social assistance recipients.
"According to the ASEAN Secretariat publication in 2015, the poverty rate in ASEAN reached 15%." One of the challenges, as documented by the ASEAN Secretariat, is the inaccuracy in identifying the recipients of assistance. I believe that this remains a significant problem not only in ASEAN countries but also globally. It is crucial for us to identify these issues, devise effective solutions, and implement appropriate policies to surmount these challenges," Tri Budhianto said.
Indonesia, as an ASEAN member country, has undertaken various initiatives to improve the mechanism for disbursing social assistance, one of which is the development of a payment ecosystem with the digitalization of Central Mapper. Indonesia offers a range of social protection programs, including: the Family Hope Program (PKH), Sembako Program, Recipients of National Health Insurance Contribution Assistance (PBI JKN), Smart Indonesia Program (PIP), scholarship for poor and high-achieving students (Bidikmisi), Pre-Employement Card, and Direct Cash Aid (BLT) for Village. This aid is channeled through the Government to Person (G2P) disbursement scheme, which continues to develop until it reaches the G2P 4.0 stage, where various assistance programs are integrated into one platform that is connected to various service providers.
Representatives from ten DJPb Regional Offices, including Special Region of Yogyakarta, Riau, Jambi, East Kalimantan, West Nusa Tenggara, North Sulawesi, West Sulawesi, West Papua, and North Maluku, attended the first thematic FGD. During the discussion, moderated by Mohamad Irfan Surya Wardana, the heads of these offices shared their insights on public spending management
The ASEAN Treasury Forum 2024 highlights the importance of closer collaboration among ASEAN member countries in managing public spending, especially in terms of disbursing social protection programs. With the increasing digitalization and integration of assistance programs, it is expected that the disbursement of social assistance in ASEAN countries can be done more accurately and effectively, which will ultimately help in poverty alleviation in the ASEAN region. [NS/HDH]
