Many Indonesian Universities Not Ready for ASEAN Economic Community

Jakarta (Antara) - The Association of Indonesian Private Universities (Aptisi) has admitted that many universities in the country are not ready for the implementation of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) 2015. "Universities are responsible for preparing competent and competitive human resources of the nation. What is going to happen if they are not ready?" Aptisi Secretary General Dr Suyatno said on the sidelines of a seminar on "The Preparations of Universities For Entering ASEAN Economic Community 2015" here on Thursday. The competitiveness of Indonesia¿s manpower is still low, with the country having around 4.3 percent skilled manpower compared with 32.6 percent in Malaysia, he stated. Suyatno, the rector of Prof Dr Hamka University (Uhamka), said even in their own country, Indonesians will have to struggle when they compete with other ASEAN member countries' human resources. The domestic manpower market would be easily dominated by manpower from other ASEAN member nations, he added. The AEC is basically about liberalization in all economic fields, such as free flow of goods, services, investment, capital and manpower among ASEAN member nations. Chairman of Aptisi Dr Edy Suandi Hamid urged Indonesian universities, particularly the private ones, to prepare themselves for AEC, as domestic universities have to directly compete with foreign universities in the Southeast Asian region. (*)