Publication & Articles

Sept 2017

By: Scott Younger

Jakarta Post

While Indonesia grapples to resolve the many issues that affect economic growth, with infrastructure and education much to the fore, it must alsostart to consider what the future country will look like as it heads to becoming the fifth largest world economy by the end of the next decade. This will require some new thinking beyond meeting current imperatives and responding beyond today's known technologies, systems and solutions.
 
In Indonesia we are outgrowing our cities, as elsewhere in the world. Urban citizens, of which there will be 90 million more by mid-century, need good quality homes, good jobs, suitable and comfortable transport, water, electricity and green spaces. Advances in technology are providing opportunities to  provide all of these vithin the sustainable "smart cities."
 
However, we also need more than this in terms of  educating and trainjng people to take advantage of what cyber technologies produce, which change by the year and can provide people with more time for personal endeavors.
 
Everyone in the newer generation aka"the millennials" and beyond will become "digital savvy"' as soon as they can walk and talk; education will have to change to embrace this challenge.
 
Nevertheless, while the energy challenge will likely be met, probably with not as clean an en ergy mix as it should be, since the country  is  well-endowed  with a vide range of fuel options, non- fossil as Well as fossil, there isalso an urgent need to address, sooner rather than later, the issues concerning water resources and food production.
 
In the field of transport, how are fast-evolving changes in modes of transport going to be addressed in the design of city road and rail links and those between cities, with the days of fossil  driven  vehicles   numbered? In cities, will we need to own our own transport or just call up a driverless vehicle and have it programmed to take us to our desired destination? This will affect the structure  of city streets.
 
It is encouraging  to  see  that the government has set in outline a plan to eliminate fossil-fuel driven transport by 2040, which would seem reasonable although some other countries will probably be more ambitious in their targets and vehicle manufactur­ ers are already addressing the pending changes for the future.
 
As well as providing the right operations support, it is.also high time to financially encourage people to think about buying hybrid vehicles, now well-developed on world markets.    ,
 
This would have a significant impact on the pollution on Jakarta streets alone, currently assessed as costing citizens totally some US$5 billion annually in wasted fuel arising from the city's traffic jam affliction in addition to the health bill from air pollution.
 
Indonesia is well endowed with fresh water and rated as the fourth wettest country in terms of supply. However, less than one percent is captured for use and more than three quarters of the 141 river basins across the country suffer periodic stress mode, where demand exceeds supply and some river flows drop to a trickle in the dry season.