Preparations are underway for the launch of the Papua New Guinea (PNG)- Indonesia Business Council Inc, says the Minister for International Trade and Investment Richard Maru. The PNG- Indonesia Business Council will be launched by the Prime Minister James Marape on Wednesday, May 7, at the National Parliament’s State Function Room in Port Moresby. “PNG and Indonesia are close neighbors connected by land border but have not developed the trade and investment relationship between the two countries through any structured formal relationships." "We are so close, yet so far away in terms of trade and investment. For the last 49 years, our focus has been on border and security talks annually. It is time PNG develops a strong, deep, and robust relationship with Indonesia in realizing the potential of both countries in trade and investment," said Minister Maru. He said the launching of PNG- Indonesia Business Council is the start of the shift in focus to the commercial dimension of our relationship with Indonesia. "Their main job is to liaise with the Indonesian private sector to drive the agenda of trade and investment between our two countries. We need major foreign direct investments from Indonesia as a matter of priority.” He added that Indonesia is currently the world’s fourth most populous nation, the largest economy in Southeast Asia, and the seventh largest in terms of purchasing power parity. "Indonesia is a global player in mining, including the extraction of oil and natural gas being a key contributor to Indonesia’s GDP. Indonesia has ranked among the world’s third largest coal and nickel producers. Downstream processing has been relatively successful- thousands of jobs have been created, higher-value skills have been transferred, and advanced technological and economic processes have been brought to Indonesia." “We do not have a major Indonesian investor in PNG when they are world leaders in many sectors today. They have a huge market and have many companies who can invest in PNG, but we have never leveraged the closeness of our relationship by learning from their success and bringing their companies to invest in PNG." He stressed that PNG has immense potential with abundant natural resources in mining, petroleum, agriculture, fisheries, forestry and services for downstream processing value addition respectively. There is no better place to learn from than Indonesia which has already mastered this approach. Minister Maru then thanked the friendship of the former and current Prime Minister and the former and current President of Indonesia. "They have really set the basis for us to now take our relationship to the next level. It has taken use 50 years to reach a point where we are now able to have a PNG- Indonesia Business Council and we also now have a Ministerial Committee led by the Deputy Prime Minister John Rosso; we are now ready to step up in our relationship." "We are hoping to secure the first K1.5 billion Indonesian investment in our country in the coming weeks,” added Minister Maru.