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LPDP scholarship: What's in it for returning graduates and for Indonesia?
When the time comes for them to return home, LPDP scholarship recipients often encounter a lack of job opportunities or are lured by more lucrative prospects overseas.
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The government’s Endowment Fund for Education (LPDP) scholarship program has allowed thousands of Indonesians, both students and professionals, to attend universities or training programs at home and abroad. (Shutterstock/File)
T
he government’s Endowment Fund for Education (LPDP) scholarship program has come under fire over concerns that many recipients choose not to return to Indonesia after enjoying state-funded education overseas due to a lack of local jobs.
Reports indicate that many LPDP scholarship recipients struggle to find employment at home that matches the postgraduate degrees they obtained at foreign institutions, preventing them from taking full advantage of their newly acquired skills and knowledge. Others decide not to repatriate and instead pursue more lucrative careers overseas.
Businesspeople have reiterated time and again that the country needs more skilled labor, but the talent pool is relatively small. According to World Bank estimates, only 19 percent of Indonesians aged 25 to 34 earned tertiary degrees in 2021, compared to 47 percent globally.
Tenggono Chuandra Phoa, secretary-general of the Indonesian Electric Vehicle Industry Association (Periklindo), told The Jakarta Post on Dec. 14 that the nation’s workforce lacked talent in the EV industry, a key driver in the government’s development plans.
“In EVs, we need highly skilled workers who can do research. This is still very hard to find in Indonesia, where […] human resources must be developed first,” he said, adding that EV technology differed from what mechanical engineering courses at universities in the country were currently teaching.
“As the world progresses toward renewable energy, lithium batteries are currently being developed, and in the future, batteries made from a variety of materials will be available. Therefore, they [overseas students] must return to Indonesia to advance [local] technology, as the country is in dire need of it.”
LPDP scholarship director Dwi Larso said the program’s 35,000 recipients to date were from diverse backgrounds.
