Currently, there are over 500,000 villages in Indonesia. Despite the high economic growth of Indonesia compared to the world and also growth in ASEAN, there is still a problem of the gini index, creating a gap between the urban and rural communities.
Seeing this reality, UGM has developed the smart village programme to serve as a solution to the problem. UGM contributes through research and community service for the rural development. This was explained by the Rector of UGM, Prof. Ir. Dwikorita Karnawati, M.Sc., Ph.D, in the Senate Hall on Monday (6/2) when opening the International Dean’s Course event.
According to Dwikorita, to accelerate the development of smart villages, penta-helix cooperation was set up between industry, society, government and the philanthropy sector while UGM continues to improve its research and innovation. To achieve the goal, UGM needs to improve governance, because good governance of the university is the key to achieve advancement of the state.
The International Dean’s Course was a programme to prepare future leaders of universities. The event lasted from 6-10 February 2017 at UGM was joined by deans, vice-deans, and directors from a number of countries.
Secretary of the UGM Partnership, Alumni and International Affairs Directorate, Dr. Danang Srihadmoko, M.Sc, said the International Deans Course aimed to equip future university leaders with knowledge on leadership.
“We hope this event will be able to increase the number of international students at UGM. Currently, there are 2,000 international students studying here. We hope to achieve a level of up to 10% international students out of the total 55,000 students,” said Danang Srihadmoko.
The speakers at the event were Prof. Dr. Peter Mayer from Osnabruck University of Applied Science, Marijke Wahlers from German Rectors Forum, and Dr. Didi Achjari, S.E., Akt., M.Com, UGM Vice-Rector.