Sri Mulyani Indrawati Quotes

Powerful Sri Mulyani Indrawati for Daily Growth

About Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Sri Mulyani Indrawati, a renowned economist hailing from Indonesia, has left an indelible mark on the global economic stage with her insightful perspectives and transformative leadership. Born in 1962 in the East Java region of Indonesia, Mulyani (often known as Muli) grew up in a family that valued education and public service. She earned a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of Gajah Mada in Yogyakarta before pursuing further studies at the Australian National University. In her early career, Mulyani held various roles within the World Bank Group, honing her skills in areas such as poverty reduction, public financial management, and structural reforms. Her tenure at the World Bank, spanning over a decade, culminated in her appointment as Managing Director for Development Policy and Partnerships. In 2005, Mulyani returned to Indonesia to serve as Minister of Finance under President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's administration. During her tenure, she successfully implemented wide-ranging economic reforms that stabilized the national budget, improved the business climate, and bolstered economic growth. Her efforts contributed significantly to Indonesia's progress and earned her international acclaim. Post-ministerial stint, Mulyani served as the Managing Director of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) from 2010 to 2017. In this role, she steered the ADB towards addressing critical development challenges across Asia, emphasizing on areas such as infrastructure, regional integration, and gender equality. Currently, Mulyani serves as the Finance Minister of Indonesia for her second term, leading economic recovery efforts amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Throughout her career, Sri Mulyani Indrawati has been recognized for her commitment to evidence-based policymaking, gender equality, and sustainable development, earning numerous accolades, including Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People in 2006 and Forbes Asia Hero of Global Capitalism in 2010.

Interpretations of Popular Quotes

"We must never underestimate the power of women in leadership."

The quote emphasizes that the influence and capacity of women in leadership roles should not be undervalued or diminished. It underscores the importance of recognizing and appreciating the unique strengths, insights, and contributions women bring to leadership positions. By valuing women's leadership abilities, we can unlock the potential for positive change, social progress, and increased productivity within our societies and institutions. This perspective is essential in fostering a more equal and inclusive world where all individuals are empowered to reach their full potential.

"Government needs to be an enabler rather than a regulator."

The quote by Sri Mulyani Indrawati, "Government needs to be an enabler rather than a regulator," implies that the role of the government should shift from strictly implementing rules (regulating) to facilitating conditions for growth and development (enabling). This change in approach fosters an environment that encourages entrepreneurship, innovation, and economic advancement. By enabling, the government empowers citizens and businesses to reach their full potential, leading to a more prosperous society.

"Investing in human capital is essential for sustainable development."

The quote emphasizes that for any development to be sustainable, it's crucial to invest in people. By 'human capital', Sri Mulyani Indrawati refers to the knowledge, skills, and abilities of a population. When we develop these assets, we can drive long-term economic growth and social progress, ensuring our advancements are durable and resilient over time. Investing in education, health, and other social services empowers individuals, fostering innovation and prosperity for future generations.

"It's important to maintain a long-term perspective and not let short-term pressures undermine our vision."

This quote emphasizes the importance of maintaining a focus on long-term goals, rather than allowing immediate or short-term pressures to distract from or compromise the desired vision. The message is about perseverance, patience, and strategic planning in achieving one's objectives, even when faced with challenges or obstacles that could divert attention from the ultimate goal. In other words, it encourages us to remain steadfast in our pursuit of success while navigating through any short-term pressures or difficulties that may arise.

"Good governance is about creating an environment where the private sector can thrive, and citizens can live with dignity."

This quote by Sri Mulyani Indrawati emphasizes the intersection between good governance and societal wellbeing, particularly focusing on the role of the private sector in economic prosperity and the importance of ensuring citizens have a decent quality of life. In essence, it suggests that effective governance isn't just about administration but also about fostering an enabling environment for businesses to grow and flourish while providing citizens with the basic conditions necessary for human dignity – adequate resources, opportunities, and protection from harm or exploitation. This perspective highlights the symbiotic relationship between government, economy, and society, as all three are interconnected and must work harmoniously for sustainable development.

If Indonesia improves governance of the fisheries sector and invests in large-scale maritime transport, it can double fish production by 2019.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Double, Production, Improves

I always enjoy the job and the work that I do, because that's the condition that I attach in accepting any job. This way, I can really work and dedicate myself to the institution for achieving the goal which I believe is a noble one.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Enjoy, Believe, I Can, Dedicate

Asia can learn much from Europe. Trade could be made easier in Asia, and the conditions for doing business could be improved by reducing red tape. In this regard, Hong Kong, Singapore and South Korea have done better than the best in Europe.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Best, Doing, South, Singapore

When millions of dollars and thousands of humanitarian workers poured into Indonesia, we quickly faced the challenge of coordinating our own bureaucracy with the multitudes of approaches and priorities the donor community wanted to pursue.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Own, Quickly, Dollars, Coordinating

Conflicting legislation and regulations, overlapping mandates, unwillingness to enforce land use, elite capture, entrenched attitudes, and lack of incentives to influence behavior are rife in many resource-rich countries.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Attitudes, Use, Rife, Mandates

Accounting for the unpaid care economy can drive progressive policies such as paid family leave, social security credits for early childcare, tax credits, and quality early childhood education.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Education, Childhood, Social, Progressive

When we rebuild a house, we are rebuilding a home. When we recover from disaster, we are rebuilding lives and livelihoods.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Rebuild, Recover, Lives, Livelihood

We know we cannot achieve our twin goals of ending poverty and boosting shared prosperity without ending poverty and creating equality for women and girls.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Achieve, Shared, We Cannot, Women And Girls

Sometimes our definitions fall short. Take, for example, the way we view income and labor. It simply doesn't cover enough of the work that women, and in particular poor women, are doing - especially in their own households and the vast 'informal' economy in which most of the world's poorest people work.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Doing, Sometimes, Income, Households

In Indonesia, where I am from, the Dutch-imposed Civil Code dating back to the colonial 1870s prevailed until the 1974 Law on Marriage granted married women greater rights, including the ability to open individual bank accounts.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Back, Code, Granted, Indonesia

Like many countries, Indonesia can transform its decision-making system to be more transparent and inclusive, particularly on resource allocation and use.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Inclusive, Like, Allocation, Indonesia

Everyone with all those good intentions came to help Indonesia rebuild from the tsunami; but the co-ordination problem was very big, because they came with their own way of doing business; they came with the inflexibility of their own governance.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Big, Rebuild, Very, Indonesia

I have my own experience in Indonesia, of course. Sometimes in these transition situations, the new governments are still clumsy and awkward in responding to this new environment in which they operate. The only thing in their DNA is the old regime.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Own, The Only Thing, Indonesia

I remember my first meeting with my management team when I became Indonesia's Minister of Finance. I was the youngest person and the first woman ever to hold that job. Everybody else in the room was male. I knew then that I had to work harder than any man to prove to them that I was capable.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Woman, I Remember, Became, Indonesia

While prosperity and longevity arrive together, they cannot be treated the same. With greater wealth, people in Asia may not have to work as many hours as they do now. But living longer means they will have to work more years, not fewer.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Wealth, Treated, Means, Longevity

Infrastructure alone won't end poverty. The World Bank had to learn this lesson, too. While we believed too much in bricks and mortar in our early days, we now understand that bringing together funding, technical expertise, and tested knowledge goes much further.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Tested, Early Days, Mortar, World Bank

At the World Bank, we are already working with our clients in developing countries to improve their governance systems, collect taxes, fight corruption, and recover stolen assets.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Clients, Developing, Recover, World Bank

Urbanization has relied on land conversion and land financing, which is causing urban sprawl and, on occasion, ghost towns and waste.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Waste, Occasion, Which, Financing

Do what is best for most people, not just a few. Prevent your elites and growing middle class, those who often benefit most from growth and development, from turning into a special interests group that blocks reforms.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Best, Prevent, Your, Middle Class

If managed well, urbanization can create enormous opportunities: allowing innovation and new ideas to emerge, saving energy, land and natural resources, managing climate and the risk of disasters.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Innovation, New, Natural, New Ideas

In the 1990s, I was among those Indonesians who demanded and celebrated the departure of our own autocrat, Suharto, and I joined the new government when he left.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

New, New Government, Joined, Departure

Although many people in Aceh are still poor and vulnerable, the province resembles nothing like the place I saw the day after the tsunami hit.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Like, Still, Resembles, Province

Economic success without accountability and social inclusion is not sustainable, and new governments often must face tough choices in order to protect the poor and vulnerable.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

New, Social, Sustainable, Economic

When both women and men contribute to a country's economic life on an equal basis, they help building stronger societies and stronger economies.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Country, Contribute, Basis, Economic Life

New leaders must also expect and manage setbacks. In post-revolutionary times, expectations are high, and the obstacles to meeting them are enormous.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Obstacles, New, Leaders, Manage

Reliable numbers about the amount of dirty money around the world are difficult to come by. But according to an estimate by the nonprofit Global Financial Integrity group, $1 trillion vanishes from the developing world's economies every year.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Financial, Year, Nonprofit, Vanishes

Until we know how many women own businesses, we may under-invest in them as entrepreneurs and economic drivers.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Own, May, Entrepreneurs, Drivers

It is rarely the quick fix that goes the farthest. So don't get tempted by political cycles and the lure of electoral wins.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Goes, Quick, Wins, Tempted

Paternalistic regulations often prohibit women from holding jobs in certain industries: In the Russian Federation, women cannot drive trucks in the agriculture sector; in Belarus, they cannot be carpenters; in Kazakhstan, they cannot be welders.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Jobs, Federation, Prohibit, Trucks

Being able to save, make non-cash payments, send or receive remittances, get credit, or get insurance can be instrumental in raising living standards and helping businesses prosper. It helps people to invest more in education or health care.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Education, Insurance, Businesses

We won't be able to stop disasters from happening. On the contrary, climate change may increase the frequency and severity of floods, droughts and storms. But we are better equipped today to prepare for them and reduce their impact.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Prepare, Floods, Equipped, Storms

If women had equal access to fertilizer and modern farm machinery, developing countries would produce between 2.5-percent and 4-percent more food.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

More, Access, Developing, Fertilizer

Women are often paid far less than men, while they also perform most of the world's unpaid care work.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Work, Often, Perform, Unpaid

People feel they are not participating in the decision-making process. Decisions are exclusive to those at the very top. You have grown up with crony capitalism and it creates ever more resentment.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Process, More, Very, Decision-Making

Development is an endurance exercise with incremental improvements.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Exercise, Development, Incremental

Many developing countries are enjoying demographic changes. They have a younger demographic composition so they're not burdened by legacy policy. Now, if you combine this with a good macro policy and ambitious structural policy, those countries are able to move more flexibly and be more agile.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Legacy, Changes, Developing, Combine

Financial inclusion helps lift people out of poverty and can help speed economic development. It can draw more women into the mainstream of economic activity, harnessing their contributions to society.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Economic Development, Lift

Women are emerging as a major force for change. Countries that have invested in girls' education and removed legal barriers that prevent women from achieving their potential are now seeing the benefits.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Change, Education, Benefits, Women Are

Many emerging countries are facing the same issue of overheating and inflation because they have been vigorously expanding fiscal and monetary policy to counter the 2008 shock.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Been, Expanding, Monetary, Emerging

Over time, Europeans have come to rely on governments to protect them from the rougher facets of private enterprise and to look after them in old age.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Over, Private, Enterprise, Facets

In middle-income countries, inequality becomes a problem because you can see there is a layer of people who are doing well, while the poor are still stuck there. We have 300 million poor in India.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Doing, Still, Countries, Stuck

In middle-income countries, inequality becomes a problem because you can see there is a layer of people who are doing well, while the poor are still stuck there.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Doing, Still, Countries, Stuck

Revolutions and their aftermaths, of course, are always fluid and fickle times, and the outcome is often perched on a knife's edge.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Always, Fickle, Perched, Fluid

Changing much-cherished bank secrecy laws is worth the effort. Corruption, tax evasion, and the capture of natural resource revenues undermine the rule of law, weaken the social fabric, erode citizens' trust in institutions, fuel conflict and insecurity, and hamper job creation.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Trust, Fuel, Rule, Conflict

People now, especially with the Internet, are connected. They have an expectation of behaviour, of accountability, avoiding conflict and fair and just competition.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Competition, Expectation, Conflict

Between 1995 and 2009, Western Europe's entrepreneurs created jobs faster than the U.S. did, and European economies exported more than the BRIC countries of Brazil, Russia, India and China. Eastern Europe's productivity increased more rapidly than East Asia's.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

India, Brazil, Increased, Rapidly

Financial inclusion matters not only because it promotes growth, but because it helps ensure prosperity is widely shared. Access to financial services plays a critical role in lifting people out of poverty, in empowering women, and in helping governments deliver services to their people.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Access, Role, Shared, Helps

Corruption, money laundering, and tax evasion are global problems, not just challenges for developing countries.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Challenges, Tax, Developing, Problems

I think the implications for the rise of China are huge in terms of the political landscape, economic balance, de-velopment thinking, and the environment.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Think, I Think, Implications, Rise

The problem of the food price is structural. The growth of demand cannot be checked in that it is coming from middle income countries demanding more quality and more quantity of food. High demand is here to stay.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Middle, Here, Income, Structural

If women had better access to the financial system - even so much as a basic deposit account at a bank - it would be a major step in the direction of greater wealth and greater economic empowerment.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Financial, Wealth, Access, Account

In many countries, laws still work to women's disadvantage - for example, by requiring married women to obtain their husbands' permission to register a business, own property, or work.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Still, Disadvantage, Obtain, Permission

China's urbanization supported the country's impressive growth and rapid economic transformation.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

China, Country, Rapid, Supported

The confidence is really driven by the woman - whether she can have the confidence that there will be enough earning or income to finance all the domestic spending - but also by the middle-income class, which for many Asian countries has become the growth power for the economy.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Woman, Income, Domestic, Asian

So much research has been done showing that the woman is the most vulnerable but also the biggest strength leading to economic progress.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Strength, Woman, Been, Vulnerable

There's broad recognition that you really have to put the money where people are going to self-manage.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Money, Recognition, Going, Broad

I am still an Indonesian citizen.

- Sri Mulyani Indrawati

I Am, Still, Am, Citizen

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