On 12 June 2016, Indonesia Investments released the latest edition of its newsletter. This free newsletter, which is sent to our subscribers once per week, contains the most important news stories from Indonesia that have been reported on our website over the last seven days. Most of the topics involve economic matters such as Indonesia's 2016 economic growth revisions, the property market, retail sector, Trans-Sumatra toll road, but also social matters such as child labor and human rights violations.

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San Francisco-based environmental organization Rainforest Action Network (RAN) released a report last week that claims Indonesian workers - including children - at North Sumatran palm oil plantations are being exploited. On two palm oil plantations owned by PP London Sumatra Indonesia, a unit of the Indonesian Indofood Group, researchers of RAN found evidence of child labor, unethically low wages, as well as other forms of worker exploitation. The report also links American multinational food and beverage firm PepsiCo Inc's products to the exploitation.

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Up to 9 June 2016 tax revenue realization in Indonesia reached IDR 364.1 trillion (approx. USD $27.4 billion), or 29 percent of the target that was set in the 2016 State Budget. This disappointing score is the result of (1) a too ambitious tax income realization target set by the government, (2) low commodity prices (particularly crude oil; curbing tax income from the nation's exports), (3) taxpayers' tax restitution (which rose 32.5 percent y/y in the January-June period), and (4) Indonesia's slower-than-expected economic growth.

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Indonesian Minister for Public Works and Housing Basuki Hadimuljono doubts that construction of the Trans-Sumatra toll road will be completed by 2019. The minister already informed Indonesian President Joko Widodo about his concern. As usual, the main issue that forms a time-consuming matter in infrastructure projects in Indonesia is land acquisition. And while land prices on Sumatra are relatively cheap, the sheer size of land that needs to be purchased for this toll road makes it a challenging process. Regarding the Trans-Java toll road, on the contrary, Minister Hadimuljono says completion by 2018 is possible.

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