FEB UI LECTURERS AND RESEARCHERS CONTRIBUTE IDEAS FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF SME DIGITALIZATION IN INDONESIA
To get a comprehensive picture of the development of digitalization of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Indonesia, the Management Institute of the Faculty of Economics and Business, Universitas Indonesia (LM FEB UI) held an exclusive discussion forum at Function Hall 9, Mohamad Sadli Building, UI Salemba Campus. This activity is one of a series of events for the 60th anniversary of LM FEB UI.
Head of UKM Center FEB UI Zahra Kemala, Ph.D. explained the results of a survey conducted by the UKM Center. The results found that 61% of SME owners were over 40 years old, 37% were 25-40 years old, and 2% were less than 25 years old. Meanwhile, from the level of education, it was dominated by high school graduates as much as 40%, elementary school graduates as much as 22%, junior high school graduates as much as 21%, people with Bachelor/Master’s/Doctoral degrees as much as 11%, and people without educational background as much as 6%.
“One of the survey results shows that SMEs have started to actively use instant messaging applications and social media but are still not very familiar with e-commerce, both in buying and selling activities,” said Zahra, at the exclusive discussion forum held on Wednesday (8/2).
Continuing Zahra’s statement, one of the FEB UI lecturers, Dr. Anna Amalyah, shared her experience working with the DKI Jakarta Provincial Government in the JakPreneur program. This program is mostly attended by participants aged 40 years and over and is more focused on mentoring so that SMEs can improve the quality of their business without having to sacrifice their time to keep buying and selling activities with customers.
“There is an interesting phenomenon among young SMEs, in the age group of 20-29 years. This group prefers to become a reseller of products from one of China’s e-commerce platforms because it generates higher margins compared to conventional types of businesses,” said Dr. Anna.
Meanwhile, to explore issues and problems related to SMEs, Hapsari Setyowardhani, S.E., M.M., who is also a FEB UI lecturer, said that there were several issues from the government, such as the absence of a neat database, overlapping and repetitive programs, the lack of effective coordination, as well as the large number of SMEs participating in education and training with a focus only on the capital assistance provided, not yet on the substance of the training.
For this reason, it is necessary to have one big data managed by the government as a database for SMEs throughout Indonesia. This database can be used by various government agencies as well as by SMEs for the purposes of market mapping and managing competition. In addition, support from the local government, such as the local government or city government, is needed to assist SMEs to upgrade.
In addition, Zahra added that the government needs to make a roadmap for SME digitalization, hold digital training tailored to market segmentation, improve digital ecosystem service standards, and need a community that can support each other’s SME digitalization practices. Based on her experience, Zahra stated that digitalization training needs to be conducted for all employees, not only for business owners, because the material is often not conveyed effectively to those who actually implement the activity directly in the field, which hinders the knowledge transfer process carried out by the government.
As an additional insight, Head of the Digital Economy Division of FEB UI Alumni Association Imanul Hakim Camil provides another alternative for the development of SMEs. He suggested that it would be far more effective to use the super off-taker scheme so that the forms of business that are partnered with brands and quality are guaranteed, which eventually make the turnover more maintained. “Because it is undeniable that SMEs always focus on sales turnover, making it difficult for them to take part in training and mentoring programs that sacrifice a lot of their time and energy that can be allocated to sell. The aim of this scheme is to create an ecosystem with a healthy SME turnover,” said Imanul.
The forum, which was attended by LM FEB UI consultants and FEB UI lecturers and researchers, was also attended by Head of LM FEB UI Dr. Willem Makaliwe; Deputy Head of Administration, Finance, and HR of LM FEB UI Dr. R. Nugroho Purwantoro; Head of the Training Division of LM FEB UI Mone Stepanus, Ph.D .; and one of the FEB UI lecturer, Rah Yuliantoro. Hopefully, this forum will produce ideas containing views and solutions that can add insight into all elements involved in the small and medium enterprise ecosystem in Indonesia, especially regulators and business owners.
