"The report that illustrates the potential of Indonesia's digital economy is extraordinary," Sri Mulyani said during the opening of the 2020 Indonesia Fintech Summit in Jakarta on Wednesday.
Sri Mulyani said researchers estimate that the growth potential for the internet would be more than triple from US$40 billion to US$133 billion between 2019 and 2025.
The value of e-commerce transactions is projected to more than quadruple from US$20 billion to US$82 billion and online travel services from US$10 billion to US$25 billion.
Furthermore, online media is estimated to grow from US$3.5 billion to US$9 billion, and online vehicle services from US$5.7 billion to US$18 billion.
"This means that Indonesia has tremendous potential in the digital economy sector, but this potential cannot become concrete if it does not develop various necessary and submission conditions," Sri Mulyani observed.
The submission condition in this case is adequate infrastructure so that all Indonesian people from Sabang to Merauke can access the internet, she explained.
"There are no terms (such as) outermost, marginalized, or left behind. They need internet access, so we need to build infrastructure," Sri Mulyani said.
Moreover, according to research from the World Economic Forum (WEF), Indonesia can succeed in achieving this goal if it can address four problems, she pointed out.
The four problems are infrastructure, including information and communication technology (ICT), increasing the capacity of human resources to enable ICT adoption, as well as institutions, and regulations, she said.
"If we look at the infrastructure, there is a slight slowdown due to COVID-19," Sri Mulyani noted.
Even though infrastructure development has shrunk this year, Sri Mulyani said she will ensure the government pushes it next year by allocating a budget of Rp413 trillion in the 2021 State Budget.
"What is that for? To build a base transmission station in more than 5 thousand villages; we know that there are 12 thousand villages that are not connected to ICT, " Sri Mulyani stated.
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Translator: Astrid Habibah, Azis Kurmala
Editor: Rahmad Nasution
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