Under a ministerial decree prepared by the Public Works and Public Housing Ministry, certified construction workers will receive wages that exceed those of their uncertified colleagues by at least 20 percent starting next year.

Companies, meanwhile, will be required to hire licensed workers in an attempt to guarantee the quality of new infrastructure.

The ministry expects to issue the decree, which is a derivative to the Construction Law passed in January, before the end of the year.

The law itself sets wage floors for construction experts, among other issues, and aims to further spur the building industry.

Higher wages would serve as an incentive for construction workers to improve their skills and get certified, Public Works and Public Housing Minister Basuki Hadimuljono said Monday.

“If it’s obligatory, there should also be an incentive for it,” Basuki said.

“Infrastructure development is still the priority of the administration of President [Joko] Jokowi [Widodo] and Jusuf Kalla for next year. The quality of the [construction] work should also be high, and that requires skilled workers.”

Construction has been instrumental in the country’s robust infrastructure development, which this year will get funds totaling Rp 401.1 trillion (US$30 billion) from the 2017 state budget. The government has proposed a higher allocation of Rp 409 trillion in the 2018 budget as it eyes faster economic growth at a projected rate of 5.4 percent next year.

Certification was also vital to maintain the competitiveness of local construction workers, who were facing tight competition from foreign workers in the Southeast Asian region, Basuki added.

Thanks to the establishment of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) at the beginning of last year, construction workers meeting regional competency standards can move freely across borders in the region.

In the last five years, the government has certified only 1 million of 7 million local construction workers in the country.

It aims to license another 500,000 workers in 2017, 300,000 of whom have been certified so far this year, in an effort to have 3 million certified workers by 2019.

The National Construction Development Agency (LPJKN), which is in charge of the certification, divides construction workers into three categories, namely operator, technician and expert.

LPJKN chairman Ruslan Rivai noted that the certification was important to control the quality of the infrastructure being built. He pointed out that a lot of infrastructure like roads constructed before 2016 was damaged within just a few months after completion, failing to meet the expected durability of two to three years.

“That is because [workers] don’t understand the proper method to lay the asphalt, and so on,” he said.

Separately, Indonesian Contractors Association (AKI) secretary general Zali Yahya said he welcomed the government’s plan to enhance the competency of construction workers through certification.

“The policy is good, but the dissemination and the education for [the workers and companies] should be intensified,” he said.

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