Indonesia is not poor. It is not behind. It is exactly where the 1st and 2nd World need it to be.
There is a particular kind of arrangement that works best when nobody talks about it out loud. Not because it is a secret. But because naming it would require acknowledging it, and acknowledging it would require discomfort, and discomfort is very bad for business.
So the world calls Indonesia a “developing economy.” Said warmly. Encouragingly. As if it is a child that simply needs more time, more patience from the adults in the room.
The adults, of course, being the ones who keep buying the raw materials.
Indonesia sits on 42% of the world’s nickel reserves. This is the mineral inside the batteries inside the electric cars that the 1st World sells to itself as the future. The green future. The we are saving the planet future.
The raw material for all of that future is in Indonesian soil. Has always been. So naturally, Indonesia is the hero of this story.
Just kidding.
Tesla signed a $5 billion deal to buy nickel from Indonesia. Taufik Ahmad, Executive Director of Indonesian think-tank INDEF, responded: “If it supplies the factory in China, it’s a shame. We must have the courage to push them to make batteries here.” He was right. It supplied the factory in China. Indonesia digs it out, someone else builds the product, someone else sells it, and if Indonesia is lucky, they sell it back, with a sleek logo and a reasonable markup. This is called global trade. It is considered healthy.
In 2020, Indonesia tried to move up the value chain by banning raw nickel exports, forcing companies to process it locally. The international response was not applause. It was a WTO complaint, filed by the European Union; a bloc that holds approximately zero percent of the world’s nickel, arguing that Indonesia should not control what happens to Indonesia’s nickel.
By 2026, Indonesia signed a trade deal removing export restrictions on nickel, cobalt, and bauxite, while eliminating tariffs on 99% of US imported goods. In return, the US reduced tariffs on Indonesian exports from 32% to 19%.
A 13% discount. For the vault. Somewhere, someone signed this with a straight face.
So the world calls Indonesia a “developing economy.” Said warmly. Encouragingly. As if it is a child that simply needs more time, more patience from the adults in the room.
The adults, of course, being the ones who keep buying the raw materials.
Indonesia sits on 42% of the world’s nickel reserves. This is the mineral inside the batteries inside the electric cars that the 1st World sells to itself as the future. The green future. The we are saving the planet future.
The raw material for all of that future is in Indonesian soil. Has always been. So naturally, Indonesia is the hero of this story.
Just kidding.
Tesla signed a $5 billion deal to buy nickel from Indonesia. Taufik Ahmad, Executive Director of Indonesian think-tank INDEF, responded: “If it supplies the factory in China, it’s a shame. We must have the courage to push them to make batteries here.” He was right. It supplied the factory in China. Indonesia digs it out, someone else builds the product, someone else sells it, and if Indonesia is lucky, they sell it back, with a sleek logo and a reasonable markup. This is called global trade. It is considered healthy.
In 2020, Indonesia tried to move up the value chain by banning raw nickel exports, forcing companies to process it locally. The international response was not applause. It was a WTO complaint, filed by the European Union; a bloc that holds approximately zero percent of the world’s nickel, arguing that Indonesia should not control what happens to Indonesia’s nickel.
By 2026, Indonesia signed a trade deal removing export restrictions on nickel, cobalt, and bauxite, while eliminating tariffs on 99% of US imported goods. In return, the US reduced tariffs on Indonesian exports from 32% to 19%.
A 13% discount. For the vault. Somewhere, someone signed this with a straight face.
Now, about corruption. It gets framed as Indonesia’s domestic failure. Something to fix from within. And yes, it is definitely needs fixing.
But a corrupted supplier is also an incredibly convenient supplier. No difficult negotiations. No insistence on processing locally. No demand to capture more of the value chain. Just the raw material, flowing out, with minimal friction.
Corruption inside Indonesia and foreign exploitation are not separate stories. They are the same story, told by two different people, who both benefit from it.
This is what a 2.5 World Country looks like. 2,5? Yes. Why? Because Indonesian people are not starving on the street. The country is too resource-rich, too fertile, too alive for that. But it is also not allowed to sit at the table where real economic decisions get made, where raw materials become finished products, where suppliers become industries. We are not poor enough to be pitied, but also not allowed to be advanced enough to be a threat. We are positioned, very deliberately, somewhere in between. So, 2,5 World Country it is.
The world calls this an emerging market. Which sounds like progress. What it actually means is: still emerging. Still not there. Come back later. We’ll let you know.
They will not let you know.
The nickel keeps leaving. The batteries keep arriving back. The trade deals keep getting signed by people who will not be asked too many questions afterward.
The dinner party continues. The food is excellent. Indonesia made sure of that.
They just were never told what time for us to show up.
But a corrupted supplier is also an incredibly convenient supplier. No difficult negotiations. No insistence on processing locally. No demand to capture more of the value chain. Just the raw material, flowing out, with minimal friction.
Corruption inside Indonesia and foreign exploitation are not separate stories. They are the same story, told by two different people, who both benefit from it.
This is what a 2.5 World Country looks like. 2,5? Yes. Why? Because Indonesian people are not starving on the street. The country is too resource-rich, too fertile, too alive for that. But it is also not allowed to sit at the table where real economic decisions get made, where raw materials become finished products, where suppliers become industries. We are not poor enough to be pitied, but also not allowed to be advanced enough to be a threat. We are positioned, very deliberately, somewhere in between. So, 2,5 World Country it is.
The world calls this an emerging market. Which sounds like progress. What it actually means is: still emerging. Still not there. Come back later. We’ll let you know.
They will not let you know.
The nickel keeps leaving. The batteries keep arriving back. The trade deals keep getting signed by people who will not be asked too many questions afterward.
The dinner party continues. The food is excellent. Indonesia made sure of that.
They just were never told what time for us to show up.
Imagery curated from Google, Pinterest, and our studio. If your work is here without a name, let us know and we’ll fix it.
