Jakarta (ANTARA) – The Indonesian Ministry of Investment and Downstreaming is working to streamline the licensing process to accelerate investment realization in Indonesia.Speaking at the MINDialogue event in Jakarta on Wednesday, Deputy Minister of Investment and Downstreaming Todotua Pasaribu said that while investment realization had continued to show a positive trend, several challenges remained, particularly in shortening the investment cycle.“Up until now, businesses in our country could only start operating after waiting for all their permits to be fully issued. This is what has caused the investment cycle to take an average of around 4.5 to 5 years,” he said.Pasaribu said his ministry was continuing licensing reforms by implementing a deemed approval scheme under Government Regulation No. 28 of 2025. The policy provides businesses with greater certainty regarding licensing timelines, allowing construction and development activities to proceed more quickly.According to Pasaribu, the reform aims to reduce investment bottlenecks by allowing the licensing process to run in parallel with development activities, particularly in fast-moving sectors.He noted that the deemed approval scheme had been adopted for 287 of around 560 types of business activities in Indonesia, with the government seeking to expand its coverage further.The Indonesian government’s efforts to streamline licensing are in line with its target of securing Rp13,000 trillion (around US$728.4 billion) in investment by 2029 to support the country’s target of achieving 8 percent economic growth.Pasaribu underscored the crucial role of investment in driving national economic growth, noting that its contribution to economic growth had increased from around 26–27 percent to approximately 30 percent.He explained that investment realization in 2025 exceeded the Rp1,950 trillion target by around 3 percent. Meanwhile, Indonesia recorded approximately Rp1,000 trillion in investment realization during the first half of 2026.Beyond supporting economic growth, investment realization also contributes to job creation. The government is targeting around 2.5 million new jobs, with approximately 1.456 million jobs recorded during the first half of 2026.