Jakarta (Antaranews Babel) - Indonesian President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) has received a delegation of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) led by Managing Director Christine Lagarde ahead of the IMF-World Bank Annual Meetings in Bali in October 2018.
The delegation comprising IMF's high-level officials, such as Director of the Asia-Pacific Department Changyong Rhee, Director of the Communication Department Gerard Rice, and Secretary of the IMF Jianhai Lin had arrived at the Merdeka Palace, Jakarta, at around 10 a.m. local time on Monday.
After an almost hour-long meeting, President Jokowi then took the delegation to visit a general hospital in South Jakarta to witness first-hand improvements in the public health care system through "Kartu Indonesia Sehat," an identification card for the poor that can be used to receive free to low-cost medication.
While in the South Jakarta area, President Jokowi and the IMF's delegates also visited the Mayestic Market to observe how improvements in the market's infrastructure may influence domestic economic growth at the local level.
According to a media advisory received by Antara here on Monday, the IMF delegation's main agenda in Jakarta was to attend a high-level international conference themed "New Growth Models in a Changing Global Landscape" on Feb 27.
The conference will be co-hosted by the IMF and Bank Indonesia, the Indonesian Central Bank, and is the main milestone in the run-up to the IMF-World Bank Annual Meetings in Bali termed "the Voyage to Indonesia."
Ting Yan, IMF's press officer for the East Asian Region, noted that the conference brings together high-level government officials and leaders in the areas of business and academics to discuss global trends and how countries can adapt their policies to the ever-evolving global landscape and continue to prosper.
Lagarde is scheduled to deliver keynote remarks and will join as one of the panelists in the discussion themed "Towards a New Growth Model in a Changing Global Landscape" along with three other speakers, including Indonesian Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani Inderawati, who had once served as one of World Bank's managing directors.
