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Indonesia Electric Power
The government-owned National Electric Company (PLN)
supplied
virtually all the electricity in the nation. At the end of
1989,
total capacity for electricity generation from PLN was
just under
9,000 megawatts, most of which was from steam-powered
generators.
Total supply of electricity in FY 1989 was 29,500 million
kilowatts, and about one-third of villages throughout
Indonesia had
electricity. In spite of consistent growth in PLN
capacity--at a
rate of about 15 percent per year since 1969--there was
concern
that demand would outstrip supply as businesses sought to
expand
manufacturing output. Industry used about 45 percent of
total power
generated. PLN began negotiations with private suppliers
for the
first time in 1992 to build power generators to sell
electricity to
PLN distribution lines. The negotiations, which involved
two
international consortiums, could result in up to four
600-megawatt
coal-fired facilities at Paiton, Jawa Timur Province, an
increase
in Java's total generating capacity of 37 percent. The
Paiton
facilities were slated to come online in the 1995-97
period.
Additionally, two other 1,200-megawatt coal-fired
generator
facilities were scheduled for completion in FY 1997 and FY
1999 in
Sumatera Selatan and Jawa Barat, respectively.
In summary, Indonesia's entire economy, like the
infrastructure
and services sector, was transformed by a government
determined to
reap the benefits of modern industry and technology. Long
a
predominantly agrarian nation, by 1989 Indonesia saw
agriculture
accounting for only 20.6 percent of GDP. In some respects,
continued economic growth in the 1990s offered more
challenges than
were confronted in earlier decades. The vast rural
population
generally benefited from rapid industrialization but
remained poor
by international standards. At around US$500, Indonesia's
GDP per
capita still ranked among low income nations such as China
and
India. With the growth in Indonesia's manufactured
exports, the
nation entered a highly competitive world economy. The
goal of rice
self-sufficiency was achieved, but further improvements in
agriculture faced more complex environmental and
technological
constraints. As the mid-1990s approached, private business
appeared
able to continue the record of growth set by the
government-led
economy in the 1970s. The government's task evolved into
ensuring
that private business success was based on efficiency, not
political connections, and providing the public services
and
infrastructure vital to an island archipelago.
* * *
A classic survey of the Indonesian economy under
Suharto,
The Indonesian Economy during the Soeharto Era,
edited by
Anne Booth and Peter McCawley, has been thoroughly updated
in
The Oil Boom and After: Indonesian Economic Policy and
Performance in the Soeharto Era, also edited by Anne
Booth.
Many of the contributors to this volume also write for the
Australian quarterly, Bulletin of Indonesian Economic
Studies [Canberra], an excellent source of current
scholarly
analysis of the economy. The regular feature, "Survey of
Recent
Developments," by different authors in each issue of the
bulletin,
gives a thorough review of new government policy and the
most
recent factual information on economic developments. An
annual
review of the economy, Indonesian Assessment, is
also
published by Australian National University.
Rice Policy in Indonesia, by Scott Pearson and
others,
and Reforming Economic Systems in Developing
Countries,
edited by Dwight H. Perkins and Michael Roemer, are
valuable
reviews of Indonesian policy making by university economic
advisers
who were often on the scene. A more political view of
policy making
can be found in the writings of Richard Robison,
especially his
Indonesia: The Rise of Capital.
The weekly Far Eastern Economic Review and the
daily
Asian Wall Street Journal, both published in Hong
Kong,
offer less scholarly but more up-to-date information. The
Indonesian economic press is improving rapidly with such
specialized publications as The Monthly Report by
the Center
for Policy Studies and the Indonesian Capital Market
Journal, both English publications from Jakarta that
regularly
review economic developments, the latter with a mind to
potential
investors in Indonesian stocks. Statistical sources on the
economy
are plentiful, including publications from the Indonesian
Central
Bureau of Statistics and Bank Indonesia, whose annual
Report for
the Financial Year gives a thorough picture of
economic
developments from the government viewpoint, and
publications by the
World Bank and the IMF. (For further information and
complete
citations,
see
Bibliography.)
Data as of November 1992
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