Indonesia’s population could reach 500 million by 2060
Indonesia’s fast-growing population could reach 500 million by 2060, according to the statistics bureau for East Java province, creating problems in education, employment and health services. The government now is mulling a new birth-control programme with families having not more than two children.
Facing slower investment and one of the highest youth unemployment rates in the Asia-Pacific region, the government is concerned the demographic dividend that attracts companies seeking a young, cheap workforce will become an economic time bomb. As Indonesia’s growth slows, the world’s fourth-most-populous nation isn’t generating enough quality jobs to keep up with the population, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said.
That prospect has brought the revival of a birth-control programme begun 46 years ago by former President Suharto, who managed to halve the fertility rate to about 2.6, where it’s been stuck ever since. The government wants to cut the rate to the replacement level of 2.1 within two years to prevent the 250 million population doubling by 2060.
The government increased the budget for family planning programmes almost fourfold since 2006 to $214 million in 2013, funding everything from training rural midwives via text messages to persuading Muslim clerics to encourage vasectomies. The measures extend efforts dating back to 1968, when Suharto set up the National Family Planning Institute to provide advice and contraceptives.
About 19.6 per cent of Indonesian youths between the ages of 15 and 24 were jobless in 2012, compared with about 16 per cent in the Philippines, according to the ILO. Unemployment, inflation and the so-called youth bulge, a phenomenon where a large share of the population is comprised of children and young adults, contributed to the Arab Spring protests that ousted leaders in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt in 2011.
Indonesia’s labour force will grow 11.2 per cent this decade through 2020, while its population will increase about 11.5 per cent, according to a Bank of America report.
Indonesia’s fast-growing population could reach 500 million by 2060, according to the statistics bureau for East Java province, creating problems in education, employment and health services. The government now is mulling a new birth-control programme with families having not more than two children. Facing slower investment and one of the highest youth unemployment rates in the Asia-Pacific region, the government is concerned the demographic dividend that attracts companies seeking a young, cheap workforce will become an economic time bomb. As Indonesia’s growth slows, the world’s fourth-most-populous nation isn’t generating enough quality jobs to keep up with the population, the International...
Indonesia’s fast-growing population could reach 500 million by 2060, according to the statistics bureau for East Java province, creating problems in education, employment and health services. The government now is mulling a new birth-control programme with families having not more than two children.
Facing slower investment and one of the highest youth unemployment rates in the Asia-Pacific region, the government is concerned the demographic dividend that attracts companies seeking a young, cheap workforce will become an economic time bomb. As Indonesia’s growth slows, the world’s fourth-most-populous nation isn’t generating enough quality jobs to keep up with the population, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said.
That prospect has brought the revival of a birth-control programme begun 46 years ago by former President Suharto, who managed to halve the fertility rate to about 2.6, where it’s been stuck ever since. The government wants to cut the rate to the replacement level of 2.1 within two years to prevent the 250 million population doubling by 2060.
The government increased the budget for family planning programmes almost fourfold since 2006 to $214 million in 2013, funding everything from training rural midwives via text messages to persuading Muslim clerics to encourage vasectomies. The measures extend efforts dating back to 1968, when Suharto set up the National Family Planning Institute to provide advice and contraceptives.
About 19.6 per cent of Indonesian youths between the ages of 15 and 24 were jobless in 2012, compared with about 16 per cent in the Philippines, according to the ILO. Unemployment, inflation and the so-called youth bulge, a phenomenon where a large share of the population is comprised of children and young adults, contributed to the Arab Spring protests that ousted leaders in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt in 2011.
Indonesia’s labour force will grow 11.2 per cent this decade through 2020, while its population will increase about 11.5 per cent, according to a Bank of America report.
