Jakarta, 12 January 2009 – The Government of Indonesia has just signed an agreement called the Jakarta Commitment with 22 countries and multilateral donor agencies. The Jakarta Commitment is a declaration by donors that they will apply the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness, which is intended to ensure the implementation of measures, both by individual stakeholders and jointly, for the purpose of improving the effectiveness of foreign loans and grants in the development process.

“The Jakarta Commitment affirms that the use of a loan or grant will not be determined by the donors. Instead, it will be determined by the Indonesian government,” said the State Minister for National Development Planning and head of the National Development Planning Agency, Paskah Suzetta.

The Jakarta Commitment also serves as a concrete step towards the implementation of the global agreements between the recipient countries of official development assistance (ODA) and the donors, such as those arrived at by the Accra Agenda for Action Forum and the Doha Conference on the Review of Financing for Development.

The background to the Jakarta Commitment is a desire to realize international commitments at the national level in order to ensure the more effective utilization of ODA. The most significant aspect of the signing of the Jakarta Commitment is a change in the nature of aid programmes from ‘donorship’ to ownership.

In his speech, Minister Paskah Suzetta stated that in future the management of aid would be conducted by domestic institutions, such as the Partnership for Governance Reform, led by Mrs. Erna Witoelar. The Partnership possesses the necessary capacity and sound relations with various stakeholders.

The 22 countries and multilateral donor agencies signing the Jakarta Commitment include the Asian Development Bank (ADB), United Nations (UN), World Bank, Australia, Austria, Canada, the European Commission, Finland, France, Agence Française de Développement (AFD), Germany, Italy, Japan, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), Korea, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The signing ceremony was also attended by the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Sri Mulyani, who stated that Indonesia was the first country to sign such an agreement with donors, so that the signing of the commitment represented an historic moment. The purpose of the Jakarta Commitment is to establish a more equal partnership between the donor and the recipient. In borrowing or in receiving aid, Indonesia will determine programme needs and whether the programme is built on the basis of equality.