TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta:Anoop Singh, IMF DeputyDirector for the Asia-Pacific region said that he'svery impressed with the performance of Indonesia’seconomic team in its efforts to promote the recoveryof the economic conditions in the country. "We, theIMF team, are very impressed with the performance ofIndonesia’s economic team," Anoop said following ameeting with the Indonesian economic team at theMinistry of Finance in Jakarta this afternoon (21/08).

Anoop made this statement in response to the likelysigning of IMF-Indonesia’s Letter of Intent (LoI) thisThursday (23/08) and the possible change in directionof base money. To begin with, onlyRp 108 trillion had been allowed as base money inIndonesia. However, the base money circulating inIndonesia on August 15, 2001 amounted to Rp 112.02trillion.

Bank Indonesia (BI) Governor Syahril Sabirin saidyesterday that he is still waiting for signals fromthe IMF as to whether they need to alter the basemoney targets. Syahril also wanted to know whetherthe BImust maintain high interest rates by altering thebase money target. Last week, the interest of Indonesian Bank Certificate (SBI) was listed at 17.3%.

Anoop told the press that the IMF and Indonesia’seconomic team have been discussing the progress of the2001 State Budget draft and another agendas. "We’vejust discussed the LoI’s progress and some agendas forthe future time. I think our negotiations ransmoothly," he said.

Anoop expected that the meeting would demonstrate somereal progress by the end of this week. "We will justwait till the end of this week to see the clearresults. We have only one week to go," Anoop said.