President Joko Widodo met with United States officials and businesses ahead of the ASEAN-US Special Summit, trying to woo potential investors to Indonesia and the region while stressing the importance of ASEAN for peace and prosperity. Jokowi and several other ASEAN leaders met with US businesses at the Intercontinental Willard Hotel in Washington, DC.
The President told the business leaders that as the president of the Group of Twenty this year, Indonesia wanted to make sure that the upcoming G20 Summit could catalyze global economic recovery, especially for developing countries.
“This will need strong partnership between governments and business communities. I hope that CEOs of US companies can build concrete cooperation in the G20 with ASEAN, especially in Indonesia. Indonesia had potential in raw industries, green energy, as well as the digital economy, being one of the largest nickel-producing nations and the second-largest producer of stainless steel. Indonesia is also home to copper and bauxite as materials for aluminum, which could become the backbone for renewable energies such as lithium batteries and electric vehicles and other sources of green energy such as hydro, solar, and geothermal powers” Jokowi said.
“We are making sure to produce important commodities for environmentally friendly electricity generators. We invite American businesses to invest in Indonesia,” Jokowi said.
May 14, 2022, TheJakartaPost
(https://www.thejakartapost.com/indonesia/2022/05/14/jokowi-woos-investors-in-meetings-with-us-congress-businesses.html)