Minister Teten Masduki Reveals Collaboration Is The Key To Successful MSME Digital Transformation

JAKARTA - Minister of Cooperatives and SMEs Teten Masduki stated that collaboration between stakeholders is the key to the success of digital transformation of cooperatives and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs).

He appreciated Bank Indonesia's move to hold the Indonesian Creative Work (KKI) 2022.

According to Teten, this has become a forum for collaboration for many stakeholders in the field of digitizing Indonesian MSMEs.

"To BI colleagues, I invite them to continue to assist Indonesian MSMEs in their efforts to make MSME products or native products made in the country dominate the marketplace and prepare competitive MSME products for the global market," said Tetep as quoted from Antara, Saturday, May 28.

According to Teten, digital transformation will encourage the resilience of MSMEs to become stronger in the midst of a wave of digital disruption and the COVID-19 pandemic leading to the post-pandemic.

So, he said, MSMEs are very important to prepare for digital transformation.

Based on World Bank research, 80 percent of MSMEs connected to the digital ecosystem have better resilience in the midst of a pandemic.

"Two things are my notes. First, this pandemic has accelerated the digital transformation of MSMEs throughout the world, including Indonesia. Second, after the pandemic, the need for MSMEs to optimize the digital ecosystem will be unavoidable," said Teten.

As of April 2022, around 19 million MSMEs are said to have entered the digital ecosystem. This figure adds to 11 million MSMEs who have been onboarding since the beginning of the pandemic or 29.5 percent of the total MSME population, and are approaching the target of 30 million MSMEs entering the digital ecosystem by 2024.

In 2030, Indonesia's digital economy potential is projected to reach Rp4,531 trillion or become the largest in Southeast Asia.

This indicates the increasing importance of preparing a strategy for mentoring and developing MSMEs through digital technology.

"The digital transformation of MSMEs is a holistic endeavor. Not only in the marketing aspect, but also in building an ecosystem that includes business processes from upstream to downstream," said Teten.

Meanwhile, BI Senior Deputy Governor Destry Damayanti stated that one of the challenges in encouraging digitalization of MSMEs is the low digital literacy of players in the sector.

For him, SMEs must have an adequate mindset and ability to adopt technology.

Another challenge is the capacity and ownership of digital devices, including the limited supporting infrastructure, such as an uneven internet network and high logistics costs.

The last challenge is the issue of intellectual property protection for MSME actors.

His party wants to increase the capacity and capability, including understanding the cultural and intellectual property of MSMEs, so that various products from that sector can be patented.

"If we don't have intellectual property or we don't patent it, this will create imitation products so that it will be detrimental to those who are the original founders of the product," said Destry.