Surabaya, E Java (Antaranews Jatim) - Surabaya Mayor Tri Rismaharini said youngsters residing in the city should well be trained to enable them to contribute to Indonesia's demographic bonus, and to compete with those from outside the country at global level in 2020.
"From now on, the children of Surabaya must well be prepared to enable them to be tough and excellent in all fields. If not, there will be a demographic disaster," she said here on Sunday.
The economic challenges that the Indonesian youths, including those from Surabaya, would undergo in 2020 demand high skills. Therefore, they should be excellent not only at Asian level but also at global level, Tri Rismaharini said.
In order to have such a tough, capable, and independent young generation, since 2010, the Surabaya city administration has initiated various programs for boosting the city's economic stability and development to make it globally competitive.
One of the action programs that the city administration has seriously implemented is closely related to the empowerment of women to enable them to become the heroines of economy and young fighters, she said.
In this context, having readiness in whatever necessary in winning the global competition, including best quality products, mentality, good ways of communication, needs to be all related parties's primary concerns, she said.
"I want our children to be successful and independent. We create our own jobs without relying on other people," Tri Rismaharini said.
The Surabaya-initiated "Heroes/Heroines of Economy and Young Fighters" program has received a recognition from Policy Associate at the Global Entrepreneurship Network (GEN) Sarolta Borzasi when attending an occasion here on Saturday.
Borzasi said since the launching of this city administration's program, the targeted residents of Surabaya have been introduced about the concepts of "go global", "go digital" and "go financial".
These all, she said, were aimed at encouraging the small and medium entrepreneurs to expand the outreach of their businesses to global level by taking advantage of the rapidly developing digital technology for gaining greater revenues.
According to Borzasi, who is responsible for supporting the connection between Global Entrepreneurship Research Network, Startup Nations members, and the global entrepreneurship community, the Surabaya city's initiated program was "excellent".
Through this program, the city government was able to build a good collaboration with so many related parties for improving its residents' economic prosperity, she said.
The "Heroes/Heroines of Economy and Young Fighters" program could even be adopted as a pilot project for foreign delegates, who would participate in the 2018 Startup Nations Summit, due to be held in the city on November 16-17, she said.
Sarolta Borzasi argued that she has never found such a similar economic empowerment program in any country she has ever visited in which almost 99 percent of its participants are housewives.
Therefore, the Surabaya-initiated empowerment program could be a good example for other countries, whose delegates would join the summit in November, she said. (*)
