Chart of the Week May 5, 2023: Urban-Rural Digital Divide in Indonesia

Summary: Indonesia’s digital economy is growing at an impressive rate. According to a report by Google, Temasek, and Bain & Company, Indonesia’s internet economy is expected to reach $124 billion by 2025, making it one of the fastest-growing economies in the world. Despite rapid internet penetration, Indonesia continues to experience a significant digital divide between […]

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Chart of the Week January 13, 2023: Infrastructure development in Indonesia and the Philippines

Summary: ACI’s ASEAN Economic Competitiveness Analysis finds differences in the performance of Indonesia and the Philippines’ infrastructure development. Indonesia performs better in physical infrastructure, while the Philippines performs better in technological infrastructure. Such disparities are intriguing since the countries face similar geographical challenges concerning infrastructure development. The countries also have similar standards of institutional quality […]

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Book Launch | Annual Competitiveness Analysis and Socio-Economic Development of Indonesian Sub-National Economies

A year into the COVID-19 pandemic, Indonesia’s economy shows signs of recovery in 2021: The country has seen a 3.2 percent annual GDP growth this year, compared to a contraction of 2.1 percent a year earlier. The 2021 growth is mainly driven by the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and wholesale and retail trade sectors. […]

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How are Indonesia and Malaysia traversing the bumpy road to renewable energy?

Gone are the days when climate change was talked about in future tense – it is happening now and happening fast. With more extreme weather events battering the region, Southeast Asia (SEA) must champion not only disaster anticipation and preparedness but also disaster mitigation equally well. As energy consumption in the region is projected to […]

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Reckoning the circumference of ASEAN’s Circular Economy Framework

The ‘take, make, dispose’ approach that formed the bedrock of the linear economy has come under scrutiny with a growing focus on circular economy. With countries moving to build their own capabilities, regional groupings too have sought to address the issue collectively. As such, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has launched the Framework […]

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Batam, Bintan and Beyond: Riau Islands as Indonesia’s hotspot for Manufacturing and Digital Investments

With proximity to Indonesia’s major trading partners, Riau Islands is one of the country’s premier manufacturing hubs, with the industry contributing over 40% to its economy in 2020. The province is home to large industrial estates such as the Nongsa Digital Park and Bintan-Batam-Karimun Free Trade Zone. In post-pandemic Indonesia, the province is a hotspot […]

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Indonesia’s Third COVID-19 Wave: Resiliency and Recovery

Indonesia’s third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic has taken the country by storm since early June 2021, proving to be one of the worst outbreaks that the world has seen. As the delta variant spreads across the densely populated areas of the country, the healthcare system faces immense pressure and is running low on oxygen […]

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Bali’s Roadmap to Recovery: Post-Pandemic Economic Strategies

As Bali reopens its borders after an 18-month hiatus, how will Bali regain its economic momentum? What are the drivers of future growth and economic resilience? ACI’s recent webinar titled “Bali’s Roadmap to Recovery: Post-Pandemic Economic Strategies”, hosted on Thursday, 21 Oct 2021 in collaboration with Universitas Pendidikan Ganesha, tackled this issue in depth. Speakers […]

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Palapa Ring Project: Indonesia’s Digitalization

Indonesia’s overarching goal to expand its basic digital infrastructure first emerged in the 1990s, through the idea of the Palapa Ring project. The project aimed to provide internet access to the entirety of the 34 provinces in the archipelagic nation and was completed recently in 2019. In 2014, the percentage of households in Indonesia with […]

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