Development of a Composite Measure of Regional Sustainable Development in Indonesia

Sustainable development has been the main agenda for Indonesia’s development at both the national and regional levels. Along with laws concerning the national development plan and regional development that mandate a sustainable development framework, the government has issued President Regulation No. 59/2017 on the implementation of sustainable development goals. The issuance of these recent regulatory frameworks indicates that sustainable development should be taken seriously in development processes. Nevertheless, several factors affect the achievement of sustainable development. This paper investigates how economic, social, and environmental factors could be integrated into regional sustainable development indicators using a new composite index. The index is calculated based on a simple formula that could be useful for practical implementation at the policy level. Three measures of indices are developed: arithmetic, geometric, and entropy-based. The indices are aggregated to be used for comparison purposes among regions in terms of their sustainability performance. Lessons learned are then drawn for policy analysis and several recommendations are provided to address challenges in the implementation stages.