Jakarta – Before President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo ascended to the highest office in 2014 there was a widespread expectation that he would move heaven and earth to reduce the immense economic disparities among the various regions of the country.

That expectation stemmed not only from promises Jokowi made during his election campaign but also from his personal background. In fact, the latter probably was probably more convincing, because words are just words, and any politician is going to find the right ones when needed.

Jokowi grew up in humble circumstances, experienced poverty early in life and was still a child when he started work in his father's furniture workshop to help out the family.

Moreover, he hails not from Jakarta but from Surakarta in Central Java. While that is still a major city, it is a far cry from the capital, which most of the country's elite call home.

His personal experience of hardship, and of free education as a way out, and then of becoming a mayor of his city, later a governor of the capital, and finally the president of the country, undoubtedly lent credibility to his promises to address a development deficit in far-flung regions of the country.

Therefore, many will be disappointed that, after Jokowi's two terms in office, the gap between Jakarta and the rest of the country, like that between Java and other regions, remains very wide.

Financial inequality, as described in the difference in per capita income, is just part of the problem. People in the capital and a few other urban centers also enjoy better public facilities like schools and hospitals. People in Java generally enjoy better housing and transportation, phone or internet connectivity and more robust electricity supply than those on other islands.

As a result, the human development index sets Java apart, and Jakarta even more so.

The government has faced criticism for placing many of its National Strategic Projects (PSN) on Java, the argument being that those could have helped even out economic devolvement.

However, that is only partly true. PSN are built where they make business sense, not where development priorities would have them. The processing of national resources, for instance, happens close to the source, or close to the market.

Another argument is that large industrial facilities built in the regions of the country are disconnected from the surrounding areas and fail to improve local infrastructure and employment.

But national development is not investors' responsibility. The whole appeal of industrial parks is that investors are provided with what they need on premises and need not concern themselves with the surrounding areas.

It is the government's job to ensure that the wealth generated in such estates is spread out across the archipelago and that the spoils of economic development are enjoyed everywhere.

If we expected the government's downstream industrial development to automatically lift up the surrounding regions, or even the whole country, then we expected too much.

Investment in smelters for mineral processing, for instance, but also in transportation infrastructure, is capital intensive and hence will not create many local jobs.

As investment moves further downstream, such as from making battery materials to making actual batteries or electric vehicles and auto parts, it will have a greater positive impact on surrounding areas.

The government must create conducive conditions for this "downstreaming" process by building the necessary transportation, energy and logistical infrastructure and providing high-quality education to spur human capital development.

That is the basis for creating competitive industries, and competitive industries are far more effective for economic development than trade barriers aimed at keeping out foreign-made goods or rules that compel foreign firms to invest in Indonesia before they may sell their goods in our market.

Of course, the government knows all that. It is not rocket science. But perhaps Jakarta has become a little too consumed with politics in recent months and years to grant due attention to basic issues of national development.

Source: https://www.thejakartapost.com/opinion/2024/10/11/nothing-develops-on-its-own.htm