The Development of Comparative Economic

Prof. Dr.  Eriyatno, the Professor of Bogor Agricultural University  said that  Indonesia should change  its economic performance from competitive economic which deals  on the competitiveness and adopt the new  economic policy frameworks on comparative perspective  which emphasize  on its economic potentials.

"Competitive economy won’t  produce  much added value to our national economic development. The opposite results will happen, we will suffer more in the midst of tight global competition," says Prof. Eriyatno. Prof. Eriyatno stated, if Indonesia continues to practice strictly on competitive economy by making various efforts to improve competitiveness, he is pessimistic that  the economic performance of the country will be encouraging. "In many global crisis, the foundation of our economy is always fragile, because we always give priority to competitiveness," he said.

Prof. Eriyatno is the author of  book on " Membangun Ekonomi Komparatif: Strategi Meningkatkan Kemakmuran Nusa dan Resiliensi Bangsa (Comparative Economic Building: Increasing Prosperity Strategy and Resilience for the Nation)" based on his policy research carried out by using an interdisciplinary assessment and by utilizing the systems approach.

In his new book, which was launched in Baranangsiang Campus,  on  20 September 2011, he  describes the details on the ideology of neoliberalism, from its existence to the perpetrators. In addition, the  book also describes the impacts of neoliberalism in the financial sector, as well as  explain  of the products of neoliberalism.

To defend the influence of the ideology of liberalism, in this book the author offers a solution based on the results  of his study on  comparative economic systems. He asserted, "The practiced  of  the competitive economy by  Indonesia, has reflected the force implementation of economic performance which  are irrelevant to the potentialities and superioties owned by Indonesia." "Indonesia has a lot of great potential on comparative economic which might be developed for national resilience and the nation building," he said.

He then exemplified  many of Indonesia’s potential, which are not owned by other states. For example, in Indonesia’s agricultural sector the country is noted for its “kopi luwak” or civet coffee  and mangos teen which is tasteful and admired by the world community. Both of these commodities is a huge potential of Indonesia.

"We should protect and develop the potentials we have both in our agriculture and other sectors. We should not duplicate to develop something which become  a trend in other countries," he stated.

Prof. Eriyatno revealed that comparative economic strategies should be taken and should be adopted for the national economic development, because it will be very  benefitial and provide added value, both for the people and state.

"Comparative Economic provides protection to the domestic productions. This is all at once an attempt to build a sovereign nation in the economic fieldpoint of view. While the competitive economy tends  to be competitive-oriented and pro open market, which makes economic resilience and competitiveness of Indonesia is getting more fragile and worsen," he explained.

Prof. Eriyatno, the  former deputy Minister at the Ministry of Cooperatives and SMEs gave an analog of such situation with the soccer, which applies two styles, namely opensive or "total football" such as Dutch-style,  and "latch" or defensive such as the Italian-style system.

The Italian national team had been four times winner for  World Cup with a "latch" strategy system.  Yet in the end we talk about the results or achievements. Why we should employ opensive system if our team won’t be  supported by  the needed players, which at the end they will lost or never made any achievements," he added

With the "latch" strategy system utilized by the Italian Football Team we should grow the future of the economic develop of  Indonesia, Prof. Eriyatno confidence that the  country will be able to build a strong national economy foundation which will play important role in the international development. (Wied).