Meeting the needs of older persons in Indonesia

Congratulations to Iwu Utomo together with Peter McDonald and Robert Sparrow from the Crawford School of Public Policy who have been awarded an ARC Discovery grant of $427,700 for the project, 'Meeting the needs of older persons in Indonesia'.

The project aims to identify the needs of older people in rural Indonesia for income, housing, health, daily care and social interaction and the extent to which their needs are met. It also considers the efficacy of existing policy programs and how these might be improved. Today, there are 22 million Indonesians aged 60 years and over, projected to rise to 48 million by 2035. Millions of older people live in rural areas from which younger people have moved to the rapidly growing cities. This presents challenges for the traditional family-based aged care system in Indonesia. It is expected that findings from the study will be published in a series of policy papers to be presented in the Indonesian National Development Planning Board.

Photo of Iwu Utomo and Peter McDonald.