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Villages key to Indonesia’s economic growth: Minister
Villages, Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration Minister Eko Putro Sandjojo spoke with The Jakarta Post about the government's experience in empowering villages.
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Villages, Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration Minister Eko Putro Sandjojo during his visit to the Jakarta Post Building on Friday, August 2, 2019. (JP/Seto Wardhana)
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em>President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo was thinking about management overhaul when he appointed National Awakening Party politician and former businessman Eko Putro Sandjojo as the villages, disadvantaged regions and transmigration minister in 2016. The former CEO of publicly listed agribusiness firm PT Siread Produce later did just what he was tasked to do: Reform the ministry and transform villages across the country. Since 2014, the government has allocated a total of Rp 187 trillion for 73,670 villages to empower and kick-start economic activities in each of the country’s smallest administrative units. While there is much room for improvement, he shared with The Jakarta Post’s Nezar Patria, Damar Harsanto, Adisti Sukma Sawitri and Gemma Holliani Cahya what the government has achieved and beyond. Here are some excerpts from the interview:
Question: It has been five years since the Village Law was passed, mandating the disbursement of the Village Fund. How is the country progressing so far and how has the fund impacted villages?
Answer: In the National Medium-Term Development Plan (RPJMN), the government asked us to alleviate poverty in 5,000 underdeveloped villages and create 2,000 independent villages by the end of this year.
At the beginning of 2018, Statistics Indonesia (BPS) reported that we had surpassed the target by creating 6,500 developed villages and 2,665 independent villages.
It is also historical for Indonesia that we have built 191,600 kilometers of roads across villages – maybe now it has reached 200,000 km. People tell me, with roads that long we can go around the world many times. I told them this is Indonesia; we are a big country, we have 74,957 villages across the archipelago.
Each year in each village they only build 600 meters of road. We still need more.
