Indonesia boasts the highest consumer confidence index in the world closely followed by Denmark According to a survey by the Nielsen Company. The survey, revealed Thursday, showed Indonesia topped Nielsen’s global consumer confidence index with 104 points, followed by Denmark (102 points) and India (99 points). The lowest score goes to Korea and Portugal, with 31 and 48 index points, respectively.
“Indonesia is the most confident country in facing the global crisis,” the Nielsen executive director of customer research, Catherine Eddy, said during the announcement of the survey.
The latest biannual Nielsen Consumer Confidence survey, conducted between March 19 and April 2 and involving interviews with 25,140 regular Internet respondents –from the educated upper-middleclass segment of the population, according to Nielsen – from 50 countries, showed that global consumer confidence had plummeted to a new record low in the past six months. The index has fallen seven points – from 84 to 77.
“We found most Indonesian respondents were highly optimistic in facing the crisis” Catherine Eddy states, adding that 86 percent of 533 Indonesian respondents were very optimistic with local job prospects within the next 12 months, while only 9 percent felt uncertain with their job security.
“Indonesians also perceive they can keep buying the things they want and need, even during the global crisis. They are also confident with their personal finances in the years ahead” she says to the Jakarta Post.
The survey revealed 70 percent of Indonesians were optimistic with regard to financial stability. Despite the optimism, the survey also showed that Indonesians tended to save their money rather than spend it during the crisis.
“Our survey discovered 67 percent of Indonesian respondents put their cash into savings, they like to spend their money for certain materials, which would benefit some companies during the economic crisis,” Catherine Eddy states.
The survey showed 29 percent of Indonesians liked to spend their money on new technology products, while 25 percent spent money on holidays Twenty percent spent money on outdoor entertainment, 17 percent on house redecorating, and 44 percent on investment in shares or stocks. Actually there was a significant drop in the investment sector. In the second half of 2008, 50 percent of the Indonesians interviewed invested their money in stock funds. The executibe director from Nielsen added the global crisis had already influenced Indonesians to be more careful in investing.
“Surprisingly, the demand to purchase new clothes is still similar to that in the second half of 2008 and first half of 2009, about 17 percent Indonesian respondents still like to buy clothes,” she said.
