The meeting between Indonesian Trade Minister Enggartiasto Lukita, the Philippine Trade and Industry Minister Ramon M Lopez and Agriculture Minister Immanuel Pinol took place in Manila, the Philippines.
Lukita said Jakarta and Manila are committed to maintaining good ties to ensure the continuation of trade and investment between the two countries. The sides also agreed to expand access of their export products to each other’s markets.
At the bilateral meeting, delegations of the two neighboring countries discussed how to apply the Special Agricultural Safeguard (SSG) to Indonesian instant coffee as the Philippines has been doing since August 2018.
According to Indonesia’s Central Statistics Agency, instant coffee – one of its key export products to the Philippines – was Indonesia’s fourth largest currency earner in 2018 with a value of US$367.4 million.
At the meeting, the two countries’ officials also agreed to reactivate the joint working group (JWG) to discuss a wide range of issues related to bilateral trade, as well as to set up a technical working group on palm tree products in the near future along with Malaysia,
Lukita hoped that the JWG will be able to come up with a practical solution and help resolve current issues that have become the focus of the two nations’ business communities.
