UNAIR NEWS – Universitas Airlangga (UNAIR) Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB) held a public lecture event on Friday (16/9/2022) entitled: “How The Government Achieve More With Less Through Innovation: Pre-Employment Cards”. The event was attended by Hengki Sihombing as the Operational Director of the Pre-Employment Card PMO and the Dean of FEB UNAIR Prof. Dr. Dian Agustia SE MSi Ak CMA CA as the host.
In her remarks, Prof. Dian said that the purpose of the activity was to discuss how Pre-Employment program helped the national economy, which was declining due to Covid-19. Moreover, the impact of the pandemic caused economic growth to contract. Because of this, investment uncertainty arises, people’s purchasing power declines, and commodities plummet.
“It happens because there is a decrease in income. One of the reasons for the declining income is the impact on the workforce, such as increasing layoffs. So this Pre-Employment Card program is part of the National Economic Recovery (PEN),” she said.
Meanwhile, Hengki Sihombing admitted that the Pre-Employment Card Program began with President Jokowi’s campaign promise in 2019. The Pre-Employment Card during the pandemic served as social aid, due to layoffs, unemployment, and deteriorating economic conditions.
“The biggest innovation of the Pre-employment Program is the incentive, which no longer provides social aid in the form of goods and cash. But through wired transfer without face-to-face, due to a pandemic condition,” he said.
In contrast to social fund assistance (bansos) which still provides incentives in the form of cash, the Pre-Employment card system is online. It was because Indonesia’s condition was still facing a pandemic and had difficulty giving incentives face-to-face.
In the last session, the man from Medan emphasized that there will be new features for Pre-Employment users which will become the program’s innovations, and the output of the pre-employment program will help the community to be productive after pandemic.
Author: Sintya Alfafa
Editor: Feri Fenoria
