Jokowi and his team made commendable progress in their first five years. The poverty rate has dropped to less than 10 percent. A light regulatory touch helped propel the world’s fastest growing digital economy, with Go-Jek becoming Southeast Asia’s second decacorn, and Tokopedia, Traveloka and Bukalapak not far behind.

Tourist arrivals jumped from 9 million in 2014 to a projected 14 million last year. Growth remained above 5 percent despite many global headwinds, thanks to steady macroeconomic policy.

But no country can rest on its laurels. Indonesia needs to achieve growth rates of at least 7 percent per annum for the next decade or more to eliminate poverty, absorb new entrants into the workforce, accelerate the growth of the middle class, and reduce income inequality as well as income disparities between Java and most of the provinces of eastern Indonesia.  

One opportunity to address these challenges is to double down on promoting manufactured exports. Jokowi and Industry Minister Airlangga Hartarto launched in 2018 a road map to leverage advanced technologies to catalyze a fourth industrial revolution in manufacturing.

Their timing is good. Trade frictions between the United States and China, and rising wages and other costs in China are causing American and other foreign companies to look elsewhere in Asia where they might diversify their manufacturing sourcing. 

Right now, much of the attention is focused on Vietnam and low-cost producers like Bangladesh.

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