Facts about Indonesia
Geography
- Indonesia exists of 17.500 islands, about 6000 of them are inhabited.
- The total area of Indonesia is almost 2 million square meters.
- In comparison; the Netherlands fits 50 times in Indonesia and Belgium even almost 60 times.
- Borneo the second largest island in the world.
- Kalimantan is the Indonesian part of Borneo, other countries on Borneo are Malaysia and Brunei.
- Two third of Borneo belongs to Indonesia.
- Borneo is 20 times bigger than Holland and even 25 times bigger than Belgium.
- The biggest ecological threats to Indonesia are: deforestation, water pollution because of industries such as gold mines and air pollution because of the burning down of big areas of forest.
(Sources: The World Factbook, UNdata)
Population
- Indonesia has more than 250 million inhabitants
- 44% of its population is younger than 24 years, this means there are about 110 million children and young people
- From these 110 million people almost 70 million are under 14
- The capital of Indonesia has 10 million inhabitants
- Kalimantan has more than 14 million inhabitants
- Kalimantan has over 400 different tribes, their people are known as ‘Dayak people’
- Every tribe has its own ‘culture’ and language. There are more than 80 different tribal languages in Kalimantan and amongst them many more dialects.
(Sources: The World Factbook, UNdata)
Religion
- Indonesia is the largest Muslim country in the world
- 87 % of the population is Muslim, 7% Christian and 3 % Catholic
- Indonesia has six official religions; Islam, Christian, Catholic, Hindu, Buddhism and Confucianism
- Every Indonesian person has to choose one of these six religions and is on their identity card
- Animism is practiced widely and mixed with all the religions, even Christian
- Animism encompasses the belief that there is no separation between the spiritual and physical (or material) world, and souls or spirits exist, not only in humans, but also in some other animals, plants, rocks, geographic features such as mountains or rivers, or other entities of the natural environment, including thunder, wind, and shadows. These spirits are worship, honored and feared.
(Sources: The World Factbook, UNdata)
Economy
- Most people live from working their land, cultivating vegetables and fruit or working on plantations
- In Kalimantan most forests have disappeared and have been replaced by oil palm plantations or rubber trees plantations
- Indonesia is rich on resources like oil and gas
- Many valuable rocks like gold can be found in Indonesia as well
- Big companies make huge profits because of this
- According to a report of the UN between 28 till 43 % of the population of West-Kalimantan lives below the poverty line
- This means between 4 and 6 million people who have less than $ 1 per day
(Sources: The World Factbook, UNdata)