Pursue Revenue and Spur Absorption in the Remaining Three Months

Entering the fourth quarter, the Ministry of Finance (Kemenkeu) revealed the potential for revenue and absorption that must be pursued until the end of 2025. With spending targets that have not reached the outlook, selecting expenditures with high absorption rates and pursuing tax compliance ahead of SPT reporting are two ways to ensure that the 2025 State Budget (APBN) also encourages the achievement of growth targets in the remaining three months.

The explanation was frankly stated in the October 2025 edition of the APBN KiTA Press Conference at the Djuanda I Building, Ministry of Finance, Jakarta, Tuesday (10/14/2025). Minister of Finance Purbaya Yudhi Sadewa led the press conference along with Deputy Minister of Finance Suahasil Nazara and Director General of Economic Strategy and Fiscal Policy of the Ministry of Finance, Febrio Nathan Kacaribu.

Purbaya opened the press conference by explaining the improved global economic growth projections, with the Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) still expansive due to reduced trade war tensions. On the other hand, foreign and domestic investor confidence is stable with declining government bond yields and a narrowing spread against U.S. Treasuries.

Furthermore, Purbaya explained that export-import performance is solid amidst global tensions. Oil and gas exports rose 9.1%, especially in metal and agricultural downstreaming. Non-oil and gas exports rose 7.7% to USD 208.9 billion, and imports rose slightly by 2.8% to USD 176.6 billion. For this reason, the trade balance surplus continued at USD 3.2 billion in the 64th month.

Domestically, domestic demand remains strong, with retail sales showing the highest increase in the last 1.5 years, reaching 5.8% YoY, household consumption levels increasing by 75%, and electricity consumption growing by 4.7% YoY in September 2025.

"We hope that the stimulus policy to the system will start to trigger public demand. Demand is starting to grow again, because if given enough money, demand will grow, especially credit from the real sector. The economy will soon show a reversal in growth direction, and the rupiah will be stronger than it is now," said Purbaya in front of reporters.

Coretax to pursue revenue

Complementing Purbaya's explanation, Deputy Minister of Finance Suahasil Nazara detailed the realization of the APBN performance. As of September 2025, state spending had reached IDR 2,234.8 trillion, or 63.4% of the 2025 outlook, while state revenue reached IDR 1,863.3 trillion, or 65% of the 2025 outlook. Of this amount, the APBN deficit was maintained at IDR 371.5 trillion, or 1.56% of GDP.

Of the IDR 1,863.3 trillion, the net tax revenue component reached IDR 1,295.28 trillion after deducting tax refunds. Therefore, although gross tax revenue is higher than last year year-on-year, the increase in refunds makes net revenue lower in the same period.

"These refunds are returned to the community, the business world, and taxpayers so that the money circulates in the economy and helps economic movement. We will continue to monitor this so that gross realization increases according to the target," said Suahasil.

Outside of taxes, revenue from customs and excise has grown 7.1% to IDR 221.3 trillion, with excise increasing 4.6% to IDR 163.3 trillion, export duties rising 74.8% to IDR 21.4 trillion, and import duties contracting -4.6% to IDR 36.6 trillion.

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Suahasil stated that, similar to September, the significant increase in export duties is still influenced by the increase in CPO prices and palm oil export volumes, as well as the copper concentrate export policy, while import duties fell due to fluctuations in food commodity prices and the utilization of a number of FTAs for capital goods and production needs.

In order to pursue revenue in the remaining three months, specifically from taxation, Director General of Taxes Bimo Wijayanto explained that he will maximize the use of Coretax, which already has 2.6 million activated taxpayers (WP). Infrastructure readiness will soon be tested with an SPT simulator that is ready to be used for stress testing simultaneous access.

In addition, the Directorate General of Taxes will intensify the pursuit of a list of 200 priority active collections with tax arrears of IDR 60 trillion. According to Bimo, of the IDR 60 trillion in outstanding taxes, his party has realized collections of IDR 7 trillion.

Details on the amount of the collection include: 91 taxpayers making installments; 5 non-performing taxpayers, 27 taxpayers declared bankrupt, 4 taxpayers under the supervision of law enforcement officials, 5 taxpayers in the process of asset tracing, 1 taxpayer in detention, 9 taxpayers in the process of preventing beneficial owners, and 59 taxpayers in other follow-up actions.

"With 1.2 million taxpayers already having authorization codes and electronic certificates, we will ensure that Coretax is ready to receive massive reporting of corporate and individual SPTs at the end of this year," said Bimo.

In addition to pursuing state revenue through tax intensification, the government is ensuring that the acceleration of spending in the last three months of 2025 is optimally realized, even though with the achievement of 63.4% of the outlook, the government still has IDR 1,292.7 trillion to spend so that state money does not go back into Bank Indonesia's SAL.

"We must accelerate state spending while still paying attention to governance and efficiency of activities, especially spending by ministries/agencies which has only reached 62.8% of the established outlook," said Suahasil. For this reason, the acceleration of capital expenditure, which has only reached 50.3% of the outlook of IDR 173.1 trillion, will be maximized.

Of the total capital expenditure, the realization of infrastructure development is key to ensuring that distribution is channeled more quickly, especially with the acceleration of activity implementation and Procurement of Goods and Services (PBJ). The construction of roads, irrigation, networks, buildings, structures, as well as equipment and machinery are spending solutions that can accelerate realization in this sector.

In addition, in order to prevent leakage, the Ministry of Finance will monitor the Fund Usage Plan and encourage payments of activity installments according to schedule, in addition to inventorying obstacles that can be mitigated.

Suahasil reminded Ministries/Agencies with large expenditures that are still below 50%, such as the National Nutrition Agency, the Ministry of Public Works, and the Ministry of Agriculture, to accelerate spending while monitoring efficiency. Until October 3, 2025, for example, BGN had only realized IDR 20.6 trillion from a ceiling of IDR 71 trillion, or 29% of the budget since it began operating on January 6, 2025.

"In addition, with the value of Transfers to Regions being quite large, we are also encouraging regional governments to accelerate the realization of spending that is beneficial for the welfare of the people, as well as encouraging growth and driving the economy," he concluded.

Need for more transparency

Although the performance of state revenue and expenditure absorption has increased compared to last month's achievement, the transparency and parameters of state expenditure absorption against the outlook can be further criticized.

Political Economy Analyst at the Indonesia 2045 Laboratory (LAB45), Nadia Restu Utami, assessed that the complete explanation of the 2025 State Budget (APBN), which is no longer published on the Ministry of Finance's website, is evidence of the declining transparency of the State Treasurer institution.

"Currently, the government only publishes press conference documents that do not provide a holistic explanation. The complete APBN KiTA document, which was previously a routine tradition, now only explains the position at the end of November 2024," said Nadia when contacted by SUAR on Tuesday (10/14/2025).

In addition, Nadia criticized the realization of state spending, which according to her, does not reflect the actual situation because it is still being compared to the APBN outlook, even though the realization should be measured against the 2025 APBN ceiling that has been budgeted at the beginning of the year.

"If we look at the percentage of spending realization against the ceiling, the amount is much smaller, which is only 61.7%, lower than the September 2024 realization which reached 65%. In addition to the slowdown in absorption, this condition shows that the budget ceiling is greater than the efficiency plan at the beginning of the year," she explained.

As a result of measuring against the outlook and not against the ceiling, according to Nadia, the government currently needs to spend Rp400 trillion per month to reach the 2025 APBN spending ceiling of Rp3,621.3 trillion. This condition is indeed unusual and is suspected of slowing down the economy in the third quarter.

"Ways to accelerate the procurement process of goods and services, especially spending that is directly related to the interests of the people, such as the distribution of social assistance and transfers to regions, can be taken to encourage realization until the end of December 2025," she concluded.