Jakarta (14/12) - Indonesia Competition Commission (ICC) has bestowed appreciation on Ministries and Provincial Governments through the 2021 ICC Award for the second time. The award presentation was held at Pullman Thamrin Hotel, Central Jakarta on December 14, 2021. Raising a theme entitled "Business Competition, Partnership, and Economic Recovery", ICC granted award divided into two categories, namely Business Competition and Partnership for 11 (eleven) Ministries and 9 (nine) Provincial Governments to those that had the best performance in implementing the policies on business competition and Micro, Small, and Medium Enterpprises Partnership.

Vice Chairman of ICC, Guntur S. Saragih, underscored the importance of business competition in the future economic recovery for it is in line with President Jokowi's message last week stating that globalization has begotten a world influenced by super tight competition. Therefore, one of the key pillars in safeguarding sovereignty is to win the competition and it has to be done by way of new inventions or innovations. The intensity of the national business competition is assessed on the basis of the national business competition index developed by ICC since 2018. Guntur spelled out that the results of the assessment of the Indonesian business competition index have increased from 4.65 in 2020 to 4.81 out of a minimum scale of 7. The said increased business competition index is judged positive for Indonesia's economic development, especially during the post- COVID-19 pandemic economic recovery period.

In the meantimewhile, Vice President of the Republic of Indonesia, Ma'ruf Amin, when delivering his directives said that all sectors are undergoing changes at the moment and he expects market strength to provide incentives so as to be adapted to the new world in a rapid time so that the crisis does not lead to a social crisis. The role of the state in the transitional period is huge, especially in minimizing the direct impacts of the crisis. The role of competition is needed for a long term, namely in order to prevent state actions against the sectors or business actors from leading to high market concentration post- the recovery. The Vice President also underscored that ICC has a pivotal role in reminding the Government in its policy making. Furthermore, the Vice President called on ICC to improve supervision in the digital sector and to establish coordination and to give inputs at all times to the government on the various policies taken in the said sector that affect the business competition map.

The Vice President together with ICC also presented the 2021 ICC Award to various Ministries and Provincial Governments on the said occasion as follows.

Note: Utama = Large; Madya = Medium; and Pratama = Small.

The theme of the 2021 ICC Award is Business Competition, Partnership, and Economic Recovery. The purpose of the theme is to demonstrate ICC's commitments to continuously supporting the President's directives and collaborating with the Government in full in order to safeguard the economic recovery process and to prevent the creation of high market concentration post- the economic recovery in the future. The President of the Republic of Indonesia has always conveyed on many occasions that the key to the economic recovery is controlling the pandemic. The Government has implemented various economic recovery driving policies and instruments in line with the pandemic control efforts. In response to the said control efforts, ICC has also made a policy to stipulate the relaxation of the application of competition law by virtue of Regulation of ICC No. 3 of 2020.

ICC has also developed an instrument commonly referred to Business Competition Policy Assessment for assessing whether regulations/policies will have positive impacts or negative ones on business competition. The assessment constitutes a checklist consisting of various questions on various apsects that will provide an indication of whether a regulation/policy has an impact on fair business competition or not. Consequently, it is to be hoped that the instrument may minimize any concentration or disruption in the market from policies that will be or are being implemented. ICC also hopes that the assessment can be utilized in a new regulation/policy formulation process or in a process for evaluating the underway regulations/policies.