Linda Yulisman, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Jakarta, May 06 2011 - The Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) issued permits to at least 51 local and foreign companies spanning a total investment value of about US$5.65 billion between January and April, a senior official has said.

BKPM deputy chairman for investment services Teuku Otman Rasyid told a media conference on Tuesday that $4.34 billion of that investment value was from foreign investors, and Rp 11.4 trillion ($1.31 billion) from domestic investors.

The permits cover new plantations — including such sugar cane and oil palm — as well as processing factories for major commodities and basic organic chemicals, he said.

One of the biggest domestic investors plans to open oleaginous plantations and build edible oil and processed milk production plants in several areas — Riau, North Sumatra, Greater Jakarta, East Java, North and Central Sulawesi, Otman said.

“The total investment value will be around Rp 6.19 trillion,” he said, but declined to name the firm.

He said the largest single investment was $962.04 million in foreign direct investment, for an edible oil production plant in East Java, which was pledged by a company owned by investors from several countries.

According to the BKPM, other large investments include a British Virgin Islands investor who will build a fruit and vegetable preservation plant in Banten with an investment of $487.56 million, and a Singaporean firm which will set up a farm in Papua worth $424.89 million.

Otman said not all of the investments would be realized this year. “Maybe it will take them two or three years to realize their investments depending on many factors,” he said, citing the issuance of building permits as an example.

Otman said that in the first few months of this year the BKPM had also received applications from at least 13 foreign companies from Malaysia, Singapore, India, South Korea, Iran, British Virgin Islands, and the UK with a total investment of around $2.17 billion.

The companies stated they wished to set up plants to make sugar, edible oil, fertilizer, processed milk, cacao, and basic organic chemicals, and geothermal power plants in areas including West Sumatra, Riau, Greater Jakarta, East and West Java, East Nusa Tenggara, East Kalimantan and Papua.

Separately, special staff to BKPM chairman Silmy Karim said the BKPM was confident that total realized investments this year would exceed the target of Rp 240 trillion, a 15 percent increase from last year’s Rp 208.5 trillion, after a significant growth of realized investment in the first quarter of this year.

The total realized investment in the first three months of this year was Rp 53.6 trillion, 27.3 percent more than the Rp 42.1 trillion booked in the same period last year.