Heaptalk, Jakarta — The pandemic moment has forced interactions are done contactless. As a result, the people’s behavior majority has turned vast into virtually. Respond to that, through the Ministry of Information and Communication, and the Government has been preparing the telecommunication and information infrastructure. Including also, they are synergizing with the digital ecosystem and collaborating with any stakeholder.
According to the minister, Johhny G Plate, how people have been shifting into digital is the best moment for us to escalate the infrastructure more advanced. It has to be more broadened reaching out to the isolated regions, such as some eastern and middle Indonesia’s provinces — to deliver internet with evenly distributed.
However, East Ventures collaborated with Katadata, found there are still some spaces that need to improve. It is explained in their research, Digital Competitiveness Index 2021 (DCI), that measure a digital competitiveness index across 34 provinces in Indonesia, that there is still an inequality digital economy — persisted not only between western and eastern Indonesia but also between Java and non-Java.
“Has the digital Economy helped them gain equal opportunities as their urban counterparts? The EV-DCI 2021 report is a testament to our commitment to cultivate a more inclusive digital economy. We created this report in the hopes that it can invite everyone to join hands and fulfill the promise of an equally distributed digital economy”, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of East Ventures Willson Cuaca said on the EV-IDC 2021 research.
In short, the development of the digital economy is only rapidly growing in the Capital City of Jakarta and the island of Java. While the other regions like Sumatra, Kalimantan, Sulawesi, Nusatenggara and Bali, Maluku, and Papua, even the infrastructure has been evenly distributed, but the Economy is not.
David Fernando Audy, Operating Partner of East Ventures, speaking on the Indonesian Digital Association Forum, found that infrastructure development has not been followed by the expected Output of the economic growth, which is considered low in the non-Java region.
“Hopefully, We can address the findings to the Government and other related stakeholders to create a proper strategy for people of non-java to boost their economy,” David said.
As an example, the top ten provinces with the highest DCI index, six of them are from Java. DKI Jakarta, West Jakarta, and East Java lie in the top three provinces. While for the non-java provinces that belong to the top ten are Bali (4), Riau Island (7), South Sulawesi (9), and East Kalimantan (10).
Otherwise, the top-bottom ten is filled by three provinces from Sumatera (Bangka Belitung Island, Lampung, and Aceh), two provinces from Kalimantan (Central Kalimantan and West Kalimantan), two provinces from Papua (West Papua and Papua), and the rest from West Sulawesi, North Maluku, and East Nusa Tenggara.
While the parameter that is examined is the input factors (Human Resources, The Use of Information and Communication Technology, Expenditure for Information and Communication Technology) with 40% of the composition.
The second and the third factors are output factors (Economy, Entrepreneurship, and Productivity Employment) with 40% of the composition, and the support factors (Infrastructure, Finance, Local Government (Pemda) Regulation and Capacity) with 20% of the composition.
Let’s put some region on the bottom ten, West Sulawesi. The input factors are the score on average 35.57, like Expenditure of ICT (39.95), the use of ICT (20.90), and Human Resources (47.98) are considered higher than the Output. The Output itself is shown relatively lower from the side of Economy (30.82), Entrepreneurship and Productivity (13.46), and Manpower (45.67).
What means from this? Mulya Amri, Expert Panel from Katadata, interpreted it as – despite the getting high of internet penetration in those regions, there was still a lack of proper education for the users. Like for example, the farmer, assuming, in the bottom ten regions, they tend to use the internet for entertainment or just communicating with their relatives. While in the top ten regions, they tend to use the internet to learn from the expert on how to do farm digitally, create insightful content on Youtube, and showcasing their products.
So it would be a good insight for the Government to evaluate the best strategy to elevate other non-java regions’ domestic Economy by providing the right strategy, for example, giving our society access to knowledge on their expertise. And it is possible, in the future, the startup incubation not only present in Java-like the top tier city; Jakarta, Bandung, Jogjakarta, and Surabaya, but also can be replicated to specifically eastern and middle Indonesia.
It is also ironic that if we see on the South East Asia rank, the Indonesian economic growth rate contradicts the national score by 11%, and it is only below Vietnam’s 16%. The only two nations that the Economy grow in two digits after the pandemic hit the world.
In fact, Indonesia’s Digital Economy has been slightly pulled back by COVID-19, but this does not mean that the road to its golden era is further away. Utilizing an analogy, we can think of Indonesia’s digital Economy all of its potentials as a rock in our hands. For more than a decade, we have built the digital ecosystem thoroughly to unearth and unleash its potential, like the rubber in a loaded slingshot.
The pandemic hit devastated almost every sector of the Economyyand forced many startups to halt their rapid growth. This has pulled back the digital economy ‘rock’, effectively loading the slingshot in an analogy. However, this slingshot that our economic level further pulled back strengthens the momentum forward because the pandemic has also triggered a rapid leap to digital adoption.
According to the SEA eConomy 2020 report, one in every three online service users in Indonesia last year was a newcomer. So it has to be our homework together as a stakeholder, including the Government, the investor, the startup founders, and the experts, to escalate the proper usage of the internet on non-java regions.
For more information about DCI 2021, you can find here
(FK)
