A national strike demanding higher wages for Indonesian workers failed to win much support yesterday, handing some welcome breathing space for the government, employers and investors just as Southeast Asia’s biggest economy begins to stumble.
Police said that fewer than 50,000 workers gathered in industrial centers in and around Jakarta to demand an increase in minimum wages and improved social welfare, a tiny fraction of the number who turned out a year ago.
Unions had predicted up to 3 million workers would join the walkout.
Photo: AFP
After years of stellar growth, Indonesia’s economy is looking less robust with the government repeatedly trimming its outlook for this year because of a softer global economy and a dip in domestic demand.
After earlier predictions of growth at well above 6 percent, the central bank now says it could be as low as 5.5 percent.
All Indonesia Workers, one of the country’s biggest unions, decided to stick to negotiations with the government and employers and not strike.
“There have been job cuts this year and if we anticipate more problems for the industries we work in like garments or textiles, then ... we have to limit the damage to our workers,” union head Andi Gani said.
The strikers were demanding a 50 percent increase in wages, which employers said would only further erode Indonesia’s already declining competitiveness in labor-intensive industries.
Manufacturers, including foreign investors, have repeatedly warned that one of the world’s biggest workforces — Indonesia is the world’s fourth-most populous nation — risks pricing itself out of the market if wages continue to surge.
Last year, labor unions mobilized hundreds of thousands of workers to push the government to raise minimum wages by an average of 44 percent in Greater Jakarta to 1.9 million rupiah (US$172) a month.
“If wage increases are too high, if we can’t compete with imported goods or labor costs in other countries, then we’d have to surrender and close our factories,” Employers’ Association of Indonesia head Sofjan Wanandi said.
“This year, the unions felt some job cuts already, so they understand what it means to keep raising wages,” he said.
The government has said that it plans incentives for labor-intensive industries such as textiles to prevent layoffs, but it has yet to implement the measures and there is widespread concern that Indonesia’s manufacturing industries are losing out to more competitive neighbors.
A number of analysts had expected labor unions to try to take advantage of next year’s general and presidential elections to win demands for higher wage increases.
Only about 7 million workers are union members. The majority of the workforce is part of the informal sector in a country where 40 percent of the population survives on about US$2 a day.
Local governments are set to announce new minimum wage levels next month.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”