Indonesia faces brain drain as skilled graduates leave for jobs abroad

Straits Times

07-06-2025

A recent report finds Indonesia lagging other countries in South-east Asia when it comes to youth employment. PHOTO: THE JAKARTA POST/ANN
JAKARTA – Indonesia has seen an increasing outflow of skilled young adults seeking work abroad in a brain drain phenomenon experts attribute to concern around job opportunities within the country.
Twenty-five-year-old political science graduate Fikri Haikal obtained a working holiday visa (WHV) in Australia and now makes a living as a poultry factory worker.
'I never thought I would be a factory worker,' he said, explaining that his original plan was to go abroad for higher education, but he failed to get a scholarship, and peer influence then convinced him to join the WHV programme instead.
He searched and applied for jobs in Indonesia, Mr Fikri said, but received no job offers.
'Meanwhile, in Australia, securing a job is easy, because there is a shortage of labour in certain sectors, such as in manufacturing,' he told The Jakarta Post on May 23.
Indonesians are the largest citizenship group in Australia's WHV programme, with the number of granted visas surging from 2,984 in the 2022-2023 period to 4,285 in 2023-2024, according to the Australian Department of Home Affairs.
On social media, graduates and young professionals have been sharing their experiences with the WHV programme, citing better pay and quality of life, though some caution that 'it is not as easy as it looks'.
Frustrated jobseekers
The hashtag #KaburAjaDulu (Just get out first) has been gaining traction on social media in 2025, as frustration and pessimism mount over Indonesia's economic situation and work conditions, encouraging people to seek better jobs abroad.
The blue-collar job in Australia provides Mr Fikri with a salary exceeding his living costs, in addition to access to public facilities and a diverse sociocultural experience.
On the other side of the globe, Ms Viona Maharani, a graduate from a vocational tourism college in Bali, is interning in the hospitality industry after recently relocating to the United States.
With prior experience as a casual worker at three five-star hotels in Bali, Ms Viona sought to develop her career.
Acquaintances of hers who had worked abroad told her that the US offered better opportunities for income and skill development.
'I will highly (value opportunities) to keep enriching my experience of working abroad, whether that will continue to be in the US or another country,' Ms Viona said.
Experts say this brain drain – or the large-scale emigration of highly educated graduates and skilled professionals in search of better opportunities and a higher standard of living – threatens economic growth, if not handled properly.
Centre of Reform on Economics (Core) Indonesia executive director Mohammad Faisal warned that a prolonged brain drain could lead to Indonesia losing its best talent that would otherwise contribute to job creation at home by helping to attract investment and driving technological progress.
Limited job opportunities mean the country's skilled workforce is not optimally absorbed, he said, as reflected in a shrinking share of formal, compared with informal, employment.
A recent report published by Core finds Indonesia lagging other countries in South-east Asia when it comes to youth employment, or those aged 15 to 24.
In 2024, the International Labour Organisation estimated that the youth unemployment rate in Indonesia stood at 13.1 per cent, higher than in peer countries like India, Malaysia, Vietnam, the Philippines and Thailand.
A biannual survey published earlier in June by Statistics Indonesia (BPS) put youth unemployment at 16.16 per cent, more than three times the overall unemployment rate of 4.76 per cent.
According to the Core report, the stagnating youth employment reflects a failure to tap into Indonesia's demographic dividend, with Indonesia now at risk of a demographic paradox: getting old before getting rich.
Mr Tadjuddin Noer Effendi, a labour expert at Gadjah Mada University (UGM), expressed doubt about the 'Golden Indonesia' vision of turning the country into one of the world's largest economies by 2045, given that skilled talent was moving abroad.
'The brain drain can slow down innovation and hinder technological development, which ultimately affects economic competitiveness,' he said.
Mr Tadjuddin also argued that the brain drain was driven by increasing labour market uncertainty amid a lack of job opportunities and a surge in layoffs in 2025, as well as by widespread corruption and extortion disrupting the investment climate.
He warned that the emigration of skilled workers could leave sectors like health, technology and education facing labour shortages, and should more young and productive workers move overseas, the country risked being left with an aging population.
From brain drain to brain gain?
However, Mr Tajuddin noted a silver lining in the fact that migrants were often 'heroes of foreign exchange'.
Often well paid, Indonesian skilled workers living abroad could contribute to an increase in foreign exchange through remittances.
Migrants have long contributed significantly to the country's foreign exchange receipts, with the remittance inflow rising 13 per cent to 253 trillion rupiah (S$20 billion) in 2024, according to the Indonesian Migrant Workers Protection Agency (BP2MI).
Mr Tajuddin also suggested that the government seize the opportunity of maximising the potential of brain gain, which would require providing adequate innovation infrastructure and facilities to attract and retain skilled talent.
'In the future, if the government can (invite Indonesians living abroad) back to Indonesia, it will be a huge gain, because they have plenty of experience and knowledge from abroad,' he said. THE JAKARTA POST/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.