The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) will enter into its thirteenth year next year, 2026. The launch of the Maritime Silk Road of the 21st century in Indonesia has been dubbed as a masterpiece of statecraft, the greatest development project in modern history and a new model of bilateral and multilateral cooperation in the world to promote prosperity and peace in Indonesia. It seems that the BRI has boosted Indonesia’s development by financing critical infrastructure, including ports, railways and airports, to reduce investment gaps, enhance connectivity and unlock natural resources like nickel for EV batteries, fostering industrialization, boosting trade and creating jobs.

Obviously, BRI has also diversified cooperation in big data management, green transformation and finance, where the two countries share strong complementarities and vast potential for deeper collaboration during 2026 and beyond. Hence, both countries should cooperate in global financial governance. Indonesia has an ambitious agenda for renewable energy and green transition and one of the main focuses is solar panel cooperation with China. The policymakers of Indonesia are now working to define where to allocate this cooperation and resources so that they further align with Indonesia’s national energy agenda. Thus, further openness, modernization, digitalization, AI and qualitative development are the way forward.

The Chinese official figures confirm that it is one of Indonesia’s largest trading partners, with bilateral trade exceeding US$100 billion annually. The two countries are enhancing their partnership across several strategic sectors, including infrastructure, digital economy and green energy. China has become an important partner for Indonesia, with significant........

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