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Indonesia Post and Telecommunications
The national postal system was the most important means
of
communication for the majority of citizens. By the late
1980s,
postal services were available in all subdistricts and in
844
transmigration areas. A substantial increase in the total
number of
post offices from about 2,800 in 1980 to 4,800 in 1989
improved the
capacity and quality of this extensive communication
network.
Indonesia had a sophisticated telecommunications system
as a
result of early investments in satellite communications.
The first
Indonesian Palapa satellite was launched in 1976 and was
replaced
in 1987 (Palapa was named for a vow of abstinence made by
fourteenth-century prime minister Gajah Mada). A total of
130 earth
stations supported long-distance direct dialing among 147
cities,
and permitted international direct dialing to 147
countries. A
total of 266 automatic telephone exchanges and 480 manual
exchanges
had a capacity of 1 million telephone lines, which was 80
percent
utilized in 1990. New regulations in the late 1980s
permitted
secondary communications services, such as fax and
cellular phone
operations, to be supplied by private businesses in
cooperation
with the government's Directorate General of Radio,
Television, and
Film.
Television and radio communications were dominated by
the
government networks, Radio of the Republic of Indonesia
(RRI) and
Television Network of the Republic of Indonesia (TVRI).
The
satellite communication system brought television signals
to every
village in the country. In the early 1990s, there were
some 11
million television sets or an average of 56 per 1,000
people
nationwide. Broadcasting was received from eighteen
governmentowned stations in major cities throughout the country and
foreign
cable news broadcasts and television programming via
satellite.
Starting in 1988, a private commercial television channel,
Rajawali
Citra Televisi Indonesia (RCTI), was permitted to operate
in the
Jakarta area, where it offered ninety hours of pay
programs per
week. In 1991 a second private television station started
in
Surabaya and in 1992 the government permitted six more
stations to
operate, expanding service in Central Java, southern
Sumatra,
Batam, and northern Sulawesi.
Radio broadcast stations and radio sets were numerous
in
Indonesia in the early 1990s. There were some 530
medium-wave,
around 140 short-wave, and 28 FM privately owned stations
and some
22 million sets or 112 sets per 1,000 people.
Government-owned RRI,
from its central station in Jakarta, offered national,
metropolitan, and FM stereo domestic programming and daily
foreign
programs--The Voice of Indonesia--in Arabic, Chinese,
English,
French, German, Indonesian, Japanese, Malay, Spanish, and
Thai.
These programs were broadcast from stations in Jakarta and
Padangcermin in Lampung Province.
Data as of November 1992
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