Not Semi Social Assistance Again, The 2023 Pre-Employment Card Program Is Only Sasar 1 Million Participants: Incentives Up To IDR 4.2 Million

Illustration of Pre-Employment Cards (Photo: Doc. Antara)

Coordinating Minister for the Economy Airlangga Hartarto ensured that the Pre-Employment Card program would continue this year.

However, the scheme for giving Pre-Employment Cards is no longer semi-social assistance (bansos).

The change to the scheme has been regulated in Presidential Regulation Number 113 of 2022, whose implementation regulations are contained in the Regulation of the Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Number 17 of 2022.

"Once again, the scheme is not a semi-social assistance anymore, but a normal scheme," Airlangga said in an online press conference in Jakarta, Thursday, January 5.

Only One Million Participants

According to the plan, the number of Pre-Employment Card participants this year is only one million or a decrease from the previous year which was attended by 3.46 million participants.

This year, the Pre-Employment Card is focused on increasing skills and productivity of the new workforce.

Training will also be conducted offline and online, different from the previous one which was fully online.

Later, the training hours will be changed, which was previously at least six hours, to 15 hours.

The value of assistance that will be received by participants also changes, which is Rp. 4.2 million per individual from the previous Rp. 3.5 million per person.

However, in this normal scheme, training costs are higher than the incentives.

As for the details, namely, training costs of Rp. 3.5 million, post-training incentives of Rp. 600,000 which will be given once, as well as survey incentives of Rp. 100,000 for two survey fillings.

This is very different from the previous semi-social assistance scheme, where participants received training fees of Rp. 1 million, incentives after training of Rp. 2.4 million which were given four times for four months (Rp. 600,000 per month), and survey incentives of Rp. 150,000.

"So, the mix of aid or the cost is 4.2 million per person, but the training costs are higher. At the time of the social assistance scheme, training was lower than assistance," said Airlangga.

Airlangga also said that now the recipients of social assistance from other ministries/agencies, such as assistance distributed by the Ministry of Social Affairs, Wage Subsidy Assistance, or Micro Business Actors Assistance (BPUM) can register as Pre-Employment Card participants.

The reason is, this year's Pre-Employment Card program no longer has a semi-social assistance scheme.

"Because it is no longer semi-social assistance, recipients of assistance, such as wage subsidies, BPUM, and PKH may be participants in pre-employment cards, because this is for skilling, reskilling, and upskilling, not social assistance anymore," he said.