Innovation in Roof Tile and Copper Craft Clusters in Indonesia

Abstract

There is increasing evidence that clusters matter in developing countries. This is very true for Indonesia, and especially its densely populated provinces such as Central Java. Klapwijk (1997), using a definition of a cluster as a group of at least five industrial enterprises belonging to the same sub-sector that operate in one village, estimates that there were some 4,400 rural industry clusters by 1989 in Central Java. Together, these clusters contain 675,000 workers, which is around 30 per cent of the total manufacturing labour force. In some districts of this province clustering is very significant: some 75 per cent of the villages in the semi-urban Klaten district contain small-scale or cottage industry clusters. It must be noted, however that the majority of these clusters are dormant or ‘pockets of poverty’. They consist of poor household enterprises which operate with traditional technology and aim at low-income markets.