East Ventures, together with Katadata Insight Center and PwC Indonesia, has launched the fourth edition of the East Ventures – Digital Competitiveness Index (EV-DCI) 2023, measuring Indonesia’s digital competitiveness with the theme “Equitable digital nation.” The report provides data on digital competitiveness across 38 provinces and 157 cities/regencies in Indonesia, showing a positive trend in digital adoption and an increase in digital competitiveness with a score of 38.5 compared to the previous year’s score of 35.2.
The improvement in the median value for four consecutive years illustrates an increase in digital competitiveness, especially in middle and lower ranking provinces, according to the Director of Katadata Insight Center, Adek Media Roza. The spread value or gap between the highest provincial score (DKI Jakarta – 76.6) and the lowest (Central Papua – 23.3) for EV-DCI 2023 is 53.2, down from the previous year, which was 48.3 in 2022. However, this increase in spread was not due to the worsening equity of digitalization, but the division of the Provinces of Papua and West Papua.
The EV-DCI report also includes the results of a survey towards 39 digital companies, analysis of eight sectors, as well as perspectives from 22 figures, including policy makers of the government, such as the Vice President of the Republic of Indonesia, Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs, Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment, Minister of Cooperatives and SMEs, Minister of Health, and startup founders such as the President of Traveloka, CEO of KoinWorks, CEO of Nusantics, and more.
The figures provided perspectives in strengthening efforts to improve the digital economy towards an equitable digital nation, emphasizing the steps and strategies they were taking to achieve these goals. The government continues to encourage telecommunication players to actively build network infrastructure to remote areas and provide digital technology skill training to promote digital literacy and business coaching for MSMEs through the Proudly Made in Indonesia (Bangga Buatan Indonesia) program. The government also needs policies related to coordination issues between the Central and Regional governments, which are often not aligned.
Indonesia’s digital economy is experiencing growth supported by strong consumption and increasingly widespread digitalization, with collaboration between the government and the private sector to maintain the development of digitalization in essential sectors such as fintech, logistics, edutech, and healthtech. To face 2023, the right strategy to maintain the development of the digital economy in Indonesia is to (1) equally distribute digitalization, (2) strengthen business fundamentals, (3) increase collaboration, and (4) implement Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG).
In conclusion, Indonesia’s efforts to achieve equitable digital require collaboration from all stakeholders in the digital economy ecosystem, including startup and conventional companies, governments, investors, and more.
11 April 2023
