IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/asieco/v100y2025ics1049007825001484.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The internet and poverty alleviation in Indonesia: Urban-rural disparities in a dual economy

Author

Listed:
  • Yokota, Kazuhiko
  • Komaki, Yui
  • Komori, Ayano
  • Nagasawa, Saki
  • Okuaki, Satoshi

Abstract

This study investigates the relationship between internet usage and poverty rates in Indonesia by presenting a Two-Sector, Two-Region model, where both urban and rural areas have industrial and agricultural sectors. Using panel data from 2009 to 2022, we classified Indonesia’s 32 provinces as urban or rural areas to analyze whether increased internet usage impacts poverty alleviation differently between these regions. Poverty alleviation in Indonesia was directly correlated with rising internet usage. However, this alleviation is situated primarily in urban areas. This finding aligns closely with the predictions of our model. Internet penetration is near saturation in urban areas, where the industrial sector dominates, limiting its overall effect. Conversely, in rural areas, where the agricultural sector is more prevalent and there remains significant capacity for Internet penetration, increased Internet usage is expected to impact poverty reduction substantially. These results suggest that, particularly in provinces with low urbanization rates, the expansion of Internet infrastructure can serve as an effective tool for poverty alleviation policies.

Suggested Citation

  • Yokota, Kazuhiko & Komaki, Yui & Komori, Ayano & Nagasawa, Saki & Okuaki, Satoshi, 2025. "The internet and poverty alleviation in Indonesia: Urban-rural disparities in a dual economy," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:asieco:v:100:y:2025:i:c:s1049007825001484
    DOI: 10.1016/j.asieco.2025.102024
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1049007825001484
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.asieco.2025.102024?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
    • R11 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:asieco:v:100:y:2025:i:c:s1049007825001484. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/asieco .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.