Home Affair Ministry Aims to Turn 100 Districts into Smart Cities

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Home Affairs Ministry is aiming to turn 100 districts into smart cities. The government is currently formulating a presidential regulation on smart cities.

Director General of Regional Autonomy Soni Sumarsono said that the regulation will combine ‘e-government’ initiative of the State Apparatus Empowerment and Bureaucratic Reform Ministry and regulation on ‘smart city’ of the Home Affairs Ministry.

The regulation will also cover data currently discussed by the National Development Planning Agency (Bappenas). “We expect to be finalized the regulation in one month’s time,” Soni said in Jakarta yesterday.

Read: Smart Cities in Indonesia on the Rise

A smart city is a municipality or district that use technology and communication to improve prosperity. At present, Indonesia has 10 pilot smart cities, including Jakarta, Makassar, Surabaya and Bandung. Jakarta and Makassar, for example, adopt smart cards to distribute social assistance and provide integrated services.

Soni said that Indonesia will have 100 smart cities by 2019 as a foundation to establish a smart country. The problem is, he said, many regions have been reluctant to develop smart city concept due to the lack of nationwide regulation. “Therefore, we need a regulation, guideline, norm, standard procedure and clear system on the issue,” Soni said.

Director General of Application and Informatics of the Communication and Informatics Ministry Semuel A. Pangerapan said that the regulation on smart cities is needed so that cities will no longer develop their own concept. Semuel said that his team will gradually prepare the infrastructure, such as internet services. “At present, only around 50 percent of regions [in Indonesia] have internet services,” he said.

MITRA TARIGAN