Earlier this week, Indonesian President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo's running mate Ma'ruf Amin - who is also the chief of the country's top Islamic clerical body, the Indonesian Council of Ulama (MUI) - revealed plans to make halal (permissible or lawful in traditional Islamic law) certification mandatory by next year.

Indonesia’s location on the Pacific ring of fire, where the Indian-Australian, Eurasian and Philippine tectonic plates meet, makes it a hotspot for earthquakes. Its disaster-prone situation is further compounded by its location in Southeast Asia, one of the most vulnerable regions to climate-related extreme events. After a season of loss, the Indonesian government is now looking at a new integrated disaster risk financing and insurance strategy to help the country finance its recovery.

Investigators are beginning the grim task of determining why a brand-new Boeing 737 Max jet flown by Indonesia’s Lion Air plunged into the Java Sea minutes after take-off, killing all 189 people on board.Divers are searching for submerged wreckage of the plane, along with flight-data and cockpit-voice recorders documenting the aircraft’s final moments.

Indonesia's quake-tsunami battered city of Palu is facing a public health crisis as torrential rains threaten to spread malaria and dengue fever to the devastated region a month after the disaster, aid agencies have warned.On 28 September, a magnitude 7.5 quake and a subsequent tsunami razed swathes of Palu on Sulawesi island, killing some 2,200 people and displacing more than 220,000.Thousands more are missing, presumed dead, after entire neighbourhoods were swallowed up by liquefaction

When the progress towards achieving the goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development as of 2017 was assessed earlier this year, the situation had worsened most significantly for the Southeast Asia sub-region when it came to containing the loss of land area covered by natural forest.

Former Indonesian general and presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto intends to review infrastructure projects that the country has signed up to as part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). His brother and campaign leader, Hashim Djojohadikusumo, explained that while there were some good projects under the initiative, there were also unnecessary ones. One such project is the US$4.5 billion high-speed railway currently being built to connect Jakarta and the city of Bandung.

Less than two weeks ago, Alibaba Group co-founder Jack Ma revealed that he was in discussion with the Indonesian government regarding the possibility of opening an institute to train tech entrepreneurs in the country. This, he said, would help Indonesia meet the skill demands of Industry 4.0, also known as the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR).

Southeast Asia is home to a wind energy “goldmine” just waiting to be tapped. Leading the way forward is the Philippines with an estimated technical potential of around 70 gigawatts (GW). However, Indonesia is not to be outdone in this regard.The largest economy in the region has attractive demographics and a surging power demand.

A large part of the Muslim world views Israel as an illegitimate state and the people of Palestine as victims of human rights abuses and war crimes. Indonesia is home to the largest number of these ordinary, everyday Muslims and its leader, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo has been placed in an extremely uncomfortable position after Israeli media recently reported Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as saying that he would work to establish strong diplomatic ties with the archipelagic state.

Perhaps one of the most widely discussed challenges that comes with a growing global e-commerce sector is the challenge of taxing that industry.