Economic development can be determined to be intertwined in each country. However, not all countries can be said to be successful in economic development. Then, what is the benchmark for a country to be said to have been successful in its economic development? Is it from the many skyscrapers? The hustle and bustle of vehicles on the streets?
Before responding to the series of problems above, it is necessary to understand that economic development is different from economic development.
For Sadono Sukirno (1996),
The interpretation of economic development is an effort to increase per capita income while digesting the potential economic power by making it a real economy in carrying out the use of technology, investment, accumulation of knowledge.
and others.
Meanwhile, economic development is a process of increasing the capacity to create an economy which is manifested in the form of increasing national income.
A country is said to be facing economic development if there is an increase in real Gross National Product (GNP) in that country. This economic development is a symptom of the success of economic development.
The comparison between the two is the success of economic development with a more quantitative character, namely an increase in the standard of income and the level of output produced.
On the other hand, economic development is more qualitative in nature, not just an increase in creation, but also changes in the structure of creation and allocation of inputs in various economic zones, such as in institutions, knowledge, society, and methods.
Back to some of the problems above. The following are some of the universal economic development identities intertwined in a country.
- Increased Income Per Capita
- Population Control
- Implementation of Science and Technology
- Quality of Life Index
- Structure Change
- Increased Income Per Capita
The identity of the initial economic development is income per capita. This is one of the markers of the success of economic development as per capita income continues to rise due to good economic stability as well.
However, this increase in per capita income must last in the long term. In addition, this does not mean that the per capita income of the country must always face an increase.
A country may face natural disasters or political turmoil that causes the country’s economy to decline. However, this situation is only temporary. In essence, the country’s economic activity is increasing on average from year to year.
Population Control
The population that continues to increase in a country does not necessarily indicate the success of economic development in that country. The large population has the potential to cause various cases, such as the slow pace of economic development, rising unemployment and crime.
Instead of population growth, population control is more appropriate as an identity for economic development. In the novel Population: Theory, Reality and Problems (2010) by Achmad Faqih, population control is an activity to hinder population development, usually by reducing the number of births.
In Indonesia, one of the government’s efforts to regulate the population is through the Family Planning Program (KB). Indonesia itself is a country that has a large population.
Every year the population of Indonesia faces an increase. In 2019, Indonesia’s population reached 267 million. The family planning program is considered quite successful in suppressing the level of development of the Indonesian population.
Implementation of Science and Technology
Science and Technology ( Science and Technology) continues to grow. However, the growth of science and technology will be meaningless if it is not accompanied by its implementation. Thus, economic development in a country inevitably has to lead to the ability to implement science and technology for the sake of increasing the welfare of its people.
Economic development must be able to provide solutions to various problems in a country through the implementation of science. If previously economic development was full of labor and capital, then it is time to rely on the implementation of science and technology as the mainstay of added value creation.
Quality of Life Index
The quality of life index is used as a marker of the success of economic development because it continues to improve the quality of life index, so that the economic development carried out is getting better. Universally, the quality of life index is divided into 3 parts. The three are the average life expectancy, the under-five mortality rate, and the literacy rate.
Let’s explore these three parts. If the economic development in a country goes well, the average life expectancy continues to increase. This is seen from the fulfillment of food needs for the entire population.
Residents can provide for their own lives so that there is almost no shortage of food. Not only food, access to various health facilities also tends to be easy. If people are sick, they can also fulfill their medical needs.
The second part is the infant mortality rate. If economic development goes well, the under-five mortality rate will shrink. This is evidenced by the fulfillment of adequate nutrition, nutrition and health services from mothers with two bodies to toddlers who are born.
The next step is to continue to improve in terms of economic development, so that the literacy rate continues to increase. This can be seen from the increasing number of facilities that support literacy levels. Citizens are also easy to carry out good communication with the existence of literacy so that they can control the growth of a country.
Structure Change
Economic development can also change the structure. This structural change, for example, the shift from agricultural activities to non-agricultural activities or from industry to services.
Changes can also include the scale of productive units, the transition from individual industry to legal industry, or the change in the working status of workers which is the goal of economic development.
This change in structure can have positive or negative implications. The positive implications, for example, are the opening of new job opportunities.
Meanwhile, the negative consequences include the decline in green land due to late infrastructure development, the emergence of various types of area pollution, and decreased agricultural land due to evictions.
Social problems can also surface due to structural changes, such as population density due to urbanization.