Three Economics and Business students of Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM) have won the first award during the Economic Debate Competition, organised by Student Executives Board of Faculty of Economic and Business of Telkom University from 21-23 October in Bandung. The students - Erlin Meida Ramadhani, Fakhrurrazi (both from Accounting class of 2014) and Salim Fauzanul Ihsani (Economics 2013) – beat nine teams from seven universities, such as Universitas Siliwangi, Universitas Pembangunan Nasional, Universitas Indonesia, Universitas Katholik Parahyangan, Telkom University, Institut Pertanian Bogor, and Institut Teknologi Bandung. The Best Speaker award was also earned by Salim Fauzanul Ihsani.
Erlin Meida Ramadhani said in the selection stage, they competed with the TEBS 56 Telkom University and EP Parahyangan 2 teams on the theme related to import policy that is believed to impact badly on national production.
“We served as the contra team, believing that contra policy would not harm the national production but increase it, particularly on food product that will stimulate producers and farmers in Indonesia to make innovations in their products and be more competitive,” said Erlin in a press release sent on Thursday (1/12).
The UGM team, said Erlin, had the opinion that the import policy is already regulated and controlled by the government. As such it would resolve the supply shortcomings and would not disrupt national production.
In the semifinal, said Erlin, they competed against the UI team on a theme on infrastructure spending policy that can increase national economy. The UI that acts as the pro team said the infrastructure policy can increase the national economy. The UGM team opposes this view, saying that infrastructure spending policy is not the main government priority.
“The government should prioritise the budget more on bureaucracy reforms,” she said.
In the final, the UGM team competed with the ITB team on the theme of the weakening rupiah that signs Indonesia’s unpreparedness facing the Asean Economic Community (AEC). Different from the previous position as the contra team, the UGM team had to direct the debate and control the argument of the opponent in order to win the debate. “Using several international economic and macro-economy theories, we finally beat the ITB team and won the first place award,” she said.