Jakarta. Indonesia is drafting a decree that will enable American energy companies to sell their products to the state-run oil company Pertamina without going through the exhaustive tender process, according to a senior minister.

Indonesia has promised American firms a red carpet as part of the ongoing tariff negotiations with the Donald Trump government. The countries unveiled a framework agreement in July and are now finalizing the deal. The White House has unveiled Indonesia’s plans to buy $15 billion in US energy, including liquefied petroleum gas, crude oil, and gasoline.

“At the moment, we are making the presidential decree to allow Pertamina to buy directly ‘without bidding’ from US companies,” Chief Economic Affairs Minister Airlangga Hartarto said in Jakarta on Monday. 

Airlangga, who had been leading the Indonesian negotiations, later revealed to the press that this special treatment would “only apply for American companies”. 

“As for the launch date for the decree, that will have to depend on when the final tariff agreement gets signed,” Airlangga said, while remaining upbeat that Indonesia and the US could strike the trade deal within this year. 

In early July, Pertamina inked memoranda of understanding (MoUs) with some American energy giants, including the Texas-based ExxonMobil and Chevron. Signing the documents was the company’s refining subsidiary, Kilang Pertamina Internasional (KPI). Indonesia still heavily relies on imported energy to meet its domestic demand. KPI also struck a separate MoU with KDT Global Resources, a trading firm focusing on energy products. 

Pertamina’s then-spokesman Fadjar Djoko Santoso told the Jakarta Globe at the time that the MoUs were related to “optimizing the feedstock or crude oil for national energy security”, among others. The MoUs also touched on possible cooperation related to refineries. Fadjar did not say the value of the MoUs, only saying that they covered “general matters”. 

Major goods trade deficits with Indonesia, which the US reported to hit $17.9 billion in 2024, had prompted Trump to launch a tariff assault against the Southeast Asian country. President Prabowo Subianto has convinced Trump to drop the tariffs on Indonesian goods from the originally threatened 32 percent to 19 percent. The energy import commitments are expected to narrow the bilateral trade gap.

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