- 23/09/2020
- Category: Commentaries
Yogyakarta, April 23rd, 2020 – The presence of the COVID-19 pandemic has caused social and economic impacts on the people of Indonesia. The data from the Indonesian Ministry of Manpower shows that more than 200,000 employees experienced termination of employment, while around 37,000 MSMEs claimed to have been negatively affected by the COVID-19. This condition also prompted the government to launch Kartu Prakerja, or Pre-Employment Card program, as part of the social safety net policy prepared by the government to deal with the social and economic impacts caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. As a form of response to the issuance of Kartu Prakerja program, the Center for Digital Society (CfDS) produced a research that aims to identify the potential implementation of Kartu Prakerja program by considering the digital landscape in Indonesia. The research was delivered through an online press conference on Thursday (23/4), by two CfDS researchers, Treviliana Eka Putri, M.Int.Sec. and Paska Darmawan, M.S.
About Kartu Prakerja
With Presidential Regulation (Perpres) no. 36/2020 signed by President Joko Widodo on February 26th, 2020, Kartu Prakerja program can be officially joined by Indonesians who meet the terms and conditions of the related program. With a total budget of 20 trillion rupiahs, the Kartu Prakerja program targets 5.6 million Indonesians who will be entitled to financial incentives with a total amount of Rp. 3,550,000, -, should they have completed the training classes that have been provided in Kartu Prakerja’s mechanism. At least until April 18th, 2020, there were 742 classes offered by 10 digital platforms that have partnered with the government in the program, with Maubelajarapa platform as the platform that has the most classes (up to 165 classes). Based on CfDS research, there are at least 9 class categories that can be attended, ranging from technology, business & finance, foreign language training, to culinary and cosmetology training. The price that should be paid in order to access these classes also varies, from the cheapest of Rp. 29,000 to the most expensive of Rp. 3,500,000. “From the distribution of 9 class categories and 742 classes offered, the number of classes aimed at increasing capacity in the use of digital devices, or digital-themed classes, dominates up to 44.2% of the amount of total classes offered,” said Trevilliana.
Digital Divide in Indonesia: Key Factor on the Implementation of Kartu Prakerja
In examining Kartu Prakerja as a program with digital-based implementation and a program that strives to improve the quality of human resources (HR) in the digital age, CfDS stressed the importance of Indonesia’s digital divide factor to be taken into account in the implementation of Kartu Prakerja program. In 2020, with an internet penetration rate of 64% from the total population of Indonesia, APJII states that 56% of internet users are in Java. Furthermore, the availability of network infrastructure and rate of income are also two other indicators of the gap in the number of internet users in Indonesia. An analysis of public sentiment towards this program which were derived from Twitter, also affirms the narrative of Indonesia’s digital divide in the implementation of Kartu Prakerja program. By using a number of keywords, such as’ program ‘,’ daftar’, ‘pelatihan’, and ‘pemerintah’, there are a number of tweets with high level of engagement, which emphasizes public unrest about a number of things related to Kartu Prakerja program, namely the amount of money paid to access the classes in Kartu Prakerja program, and the ‘domination’ of digital-themed classes.
Digital Skills: Target of the Kartu Prakerja Program
Based on the above analysis, CfDS concludes that the target recipients of Kartu Prakerja program are Indonesian people with sufficient digital skills and have access to the internet and other digital technologies. However, there are other things that the government can pay more attention to in the future implementation of Kartu Prakerja program. “The government needs to pay more attention to the accessibility and capacity of Kartu Prakerja’s target beneficiaries. In addition, other things such as guaranteeing the security and privacy of data from the participants of Kartu Prakerja also become very crucial, especially when there is a mechanism for sharing data between the government and the digital platform that provides the classes in Kartu Prakerja program”, said Paska.
Writer: Raka Wicaksono
