Air pollution has become one of the most critical issues in this modern era since it is responsible for millions of deaths globally each year [1] and has an economic impact because of the loss of productive days due to illnesses caused by exposure to pollutants [2].
Interestingly, as the most polluted country in Southeast Asia in 2021 [3], in Indonesia, this issue just went viral in 2023, not long after Indonesian President Joko Widodo was reported that he got health problem issue caused by the poor air quality [4], when at the same time, Indonesia’s capital, Jakarta was also announced being topped the list as the world’s most polluted city and having consistently ranked among the 10 most polluted cities globally [5].
Hence, in December 2023, Snapcart conducted a study to figure out Indonesians’ awareness level toward this issue and how they deal with it, after it went viral. You can check this infographic below to see the results.
From 1.000 respondents who live across various areas/cities in Indonesia, we found out that only less than a half of population (41%) know and understand about this air pollution problem. Meanwhile most of them (52%) just know about this issue without really understanding it. Many people in Indonesia got the information about it from social media posts and news on TV/magazine/internet.
On the other hand, we also tried to discover some cities in Indonesia’s level of air quality, according to our respondents’ perspective. And the result is from range 1 (hazardous) to 10 (very good) of air quality level, most Indonesians think that the area/city where they live such as Jabodetabek, Bandung, Medan, Surabaya, Makassar, and other cities are in the rank between 5 and 7 (medium). However strangely, many of those who live in Balikpapan think that their city is in the rank between 4 and 5, but at the same time many who think the air quality level in their city is in the 8th rank (good). You can check the details of this data on the infographic above.
Air Pollution Impact
Even though only 11% of Indonesians who know about this air pollution issue because they personally feel the impacts of it, 87% of people in Indonesia just realized that some unpleasant phenomena and health problems they have experienced recently are the effects of air pollution after they got information about this issue. Where in addition, many people (46%) confessed that the impact of air pollution has extremely disturbed them.
Amongst many impacts of the air pollution, respiratory disorders, some of eye health issues, and headache/dizzy are the most common symptoms that are experienced by people in Indonesia. And majority of Indonesians (79%) said their effort to prevent or reduce those impacts is by wearing mask. You can see their complete answers on the infographic at the beginning of this article.
Desired Solutions
There are various solutions for this issue. Interestingly in this case, many of our respondents confessed that they hope this issue will be solved by Indonesian citizens itself instead of by the government.
Many people think that the increasing level of bad air quality in Indonesia is caused by the increasing number of fossil fuel vehicles on the road. Therefore, amongst many choices exist to solve this problem, most people want Indonesian citizens start using their personal vehicle less and switch to public transportations/using environmentally vehicle/walk by foot to go to their destination.
Intriguingly, most of those who desire this solution use motorbikes very often in their daily lives, yet there is no further explanation from them whether they use fossil fuel motorbikes or electric vehicles.
Interested in discovering certain issues from people’s perspective? Contact us at partners@snapcart.global .
Sources:
[1] https://ourworldindata.org/air-pollution
[2] https://iesr.or.id/en/air-pollution-economic-impacts-and-steps-towards-clean-air
[3] https://indonesiaexpat.id/news/indonesia-most-polluted-country-in-southeast-asia/
[4] https://time.com/6305644/indonesia-air-pollution-jakarta-smog-jokowi-cough/
[5] https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/indonesias-capital-named-worlds-most-polluted-city-2023-08-09/
