REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- Land ownership is crucial for narrowing the social gap and realizing economic equality, according to Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Darmin Nasution.

"We should improve the issuance of land certificates. This is not easy because we have been late by 72 years," Minister Nasution said here, Tuesday, while speaking at a seminar titled "Indonesia is Heading Toward Just Economic."

Certain groups have held most of the land. Several low- and middle-class communities do not own land, hence they become helpless and are unable to improve the quality of their life, according to Nasution.

To address the problem, the government is currently implementing a land certification program to reduce the poverty rate and achieve economic equality. 

President Joko Widodo has included the land certification program in the medium-term national development plan.

Indonesian Agrarian Affairs and Spatial Layout Ministry/National Land Agency has planned to conduct land certification across the country and expects to complete the process by 2025.

According to last year's data, Indonesia had 178 million hectares of land plots, but only 40 percent of them were registered and 67 percent of them already certified.

Economic equality can also be achieved by improving the quality of vocational education needed to help promote development.

Besides this, there is a need to control the swift growth of convenience stores and mini-markets in several regions to offer greater opportunities to traditional stores to develop, the minister said.

Meanwhile, Vivi Alatas, an economist of World Bank, said social allowances should not be viewed as a major solution to address the social gap, as more concrete efforts are needed, for instance, by improving the skills of the public and by maintaining stability in food prices.

"Skills could be a way out for workers to increase their productivity. Unfortunately, only five percent of the companies have developed a modern and relevant training system," she said.

Moreover, the market operation instrument is important to monitor the rice prices since the current 10 percent hike in the commodity could further lead to 1.2 million people falling below the poverty line," Alatas said. 

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