TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Statistics Indonesia or BPS recorded over 25.22 million people living in poverty in Indonesia as of March 2024. Acting Principal Secretary of BPS, Imam Machdi said the number was down 0.33 percent compared to the previous year's 25.9 million.

Poverty in Indonesia declined from 9.36 percent to 9.03 percent this year. Imam said the poverty reduction was bigger in rural areas than urban. The poverty rate in rural areas is lower than the pandemic, while the opposite is true for urban areas.

However, Imam said on Monday that the poverty gap between urban and rural areas is quite significant. In March 2024, the poverty rate in rural areas reached 11.79 and 7.09 percent in urban areas.

The decline in poverty rate occurred in all Indonesian regions, with the most recorded in Bali and Nusa Tenggara. Java and Sumatra noted the biggest distribution of poverty in Indonesia; 13.42 million in Java and 5.55 million in Jakarta are still living in poverty.

Spatially, most provinces in Indonesia have above-average poverty rates. Imam explained that around 20 percent of provinces’ poverty rates are above the national average while 18 percent are below the average poverty rate.

"All provinces in Papua have poverty rates above the national average and most provinces in Kalimantan are below the national average except for North Kalimantan," he said.

Papua Pegunungan recorded the highest poverty rate at 32.7 percent compared to Bali which has the lowest poverty rate of 4.00 percent.

BPS noted that over the last decade, the number of people living in poverty in Indonesia has decreased by 3.06 million people, or 2.22 percent. As for 2025, the government targets to reduce the poverty rate to 7-8 percent.

ILONA ESTHERINA

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