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Challenges to the next president in 2024
Next year on Oct. 20, based on the schedule provided by the General Elections Commission (KPU), we will have a new president to replace the incumbent Joko “Jokowi" Widodo.
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Trucks drive past stacks of containers at Tanjung Priok Port in Jakarta on Feb. 3, 2023.
(Reuters/Ajeng Dinar Ulfiana)
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ext year on Oct. 20, based on the schedule provided by the General Elections Commission (KPU), we will have a new president to replace the incumbent Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, who is currently at the end of his second term.
To date, based on media reports, the three candidates in the 2024 presidential election are Ganjar Pranowo, Prabowo Subianto and Anies Rasyid Baswedan.
As they are not yet registered as the official presidential candidates, they have yet to submit their campaign programs for the five-year term, if elected. Their campaign programs are, of course, not aimed at evaluating the presidential candidates; instead they aim to diagnose what the key agendas are in the economic development ahead.
The main challenges that Indonesia deals with in the upcoming presidential period is to prepare for the demographic bonus. According to the population projection for 2020 to 2050 by Statistics Indonesia (BPS), in 2041 the dependency ratio will be above 50 percent; this means that the number of unproductive people will be higher than the number of productive people.
Accordingly, we should be able to maximize the window of opportunity in the next 17 years before the population starts to enter the aging period.
The economy should grow consistently by 6 to 7 percent to ensure that Indonesia is able to jump to a high-income country group before entering the aging period. Otherwise, Indonesia may be stuck in the middle-income trap with sustained low economic growth, an aging population, poor quality of life and low technological capabilities.
Here we identify some important work that the new president next year should consider prioritizing in their campaign program.
