Indonesia parliament approves 2022 budget

Indonesia's parliament on Thursday approved President Joko Widodo's $190 billion budget for next year, representing a fiscal deficit of 4.85per cent of gross domestic product, the house speaker Puan Maharani said.

The budget aims to maintain recovery momentum in the economy in 2022 from the impact of the coronavirus pandemic and assumes growth of 5.2per cent next year. At the same time, the government said it will set the groundwork to reduce the fiscal deficit to below 3per cent of gross domestic product in 2023 to comply with the law. Total spending was approved at 2,714.2 trillion rupiah ($190.40 billion), slightly higher than proposed by the president last month.