By : Nyak Fatia Fadhillah )*
The Aneuk Muda Aceh Excellent and Great (AMANAH) program is a stimulus to create an independent economy for young people who are the next generation of the nation in Aceh. Therefore, it is not surprising why many parties give very high appreciation for the running of the AMANAH program.
The reason is, through the program initiated by the State Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Indonesia (BIN RI), the youth in the Veranda of Mecca will be able to play an increasingly active role in participating in building economic pillars to develop and prosper their region.
BIN implemented this program to facilitate and fully support the development of creativity and innovation possessed by Acehnese youth. So, later it will be able to help them to present much more work which can directly or indirectly have an impact on independent economic development.
Acehnese youth who are independent are the main pillar of achieving sustainable economic development in Rencong Country. In fact, it will not only have an impact in Aceh, but it is not impossible that economic improvement will also occur nationally.
The reason is that the economic development of a country cannot occur if it only depends on the development of the economic sector in urban areas or in certain areas, but economic development is also greatly influenced by economic progress in other areas, such as in remote areas and villages.
Behind the natural beauty and life of the people of Aceh, there is enormous potential which is often overlooked, such as the potential as well as the talents and interests of the young people there.
Knowing the large potential possessed by young people in Aceh, BIN then implemented the AMANAH program as a forum for improving the quality of young Acehnese human resources (HR) to support an independent economy in the region.
The youth of Aceh are indeed the next generation of the nation who have a very important role in overseeing the achievement of sustainable and independent economic development, and this makes them the main pillars in carrying out the wheels of development at the regional level.
The AMANAH program initiated by BIN makes the economy much more independent, where the increase in regional economic activity will be directly supervised by young people through downstream activities and the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) sector.
Head of the Atsiri Research Center Center for Excellence in Higher Education Science and Technology (ARC-PUIPT) Aceh Patchouli, Syiah Kuala University (USK), Syaifullah Muhammad said that through the AMANAH program, so far he has been involved in a lot of innovation development and downstream patchouli in Aceh.
The existence of the AMANAH Program has also received appreciation from academic circles. Regarding this, the Chancellor of Syah Kuala University, Prof. Dr. Ir. Marwan views that AMANAH’s presence can help improve Aceh’s economy. He also invited all Acehnese youth and women to take part in making Aceh a center for the MSME industry in improving Aceh’s economy together with AMANAH.
Likewise, the Chancellor of Teuku Umar University, Prof. Dr. Ir. Ishak assesses that AMANAH also acts as a creative hub with special facilities for MSMEs to build business networks and strengthen business entities. Not to forget, he also expressed his gratitude to the President of the Republic of Indonesia who provided space for Acehnese youth through AMANAH to develop creative innovations for local creative economy products.
The right approach was taken by BIN due to the great support from many other parties, which means that collaboration between universities, government, business world, society and the media continues to bring fresh air for improving the independent economy through the use of patchouli derivative products in the Veranda of Mecca.
One of the parties providing this assistance, namely ARC as an element of higher education, is aggressively carrying out various training and technology transfers to students, business start-ups and MSMEs.
The President of the Republic of Indonesia (RI) Joko Widodo (Jokowi) has also given tasks directly to the institution led by Police General (Ret.) Prof. Dr. Budi Gunawan’s goal is to build an independent local economy in Aceh through the sustainability of the AMANAH program.
In the Aneuk Muda Aceh Excellent and Great program, they collaborated with ARC in conducting training, production, innovation assistance in patchouli derivative products, in which 72 Acehnese young people took part in the training activities. They were all trained to create and produce four innovative patchouli derivative products, then trained in making packaging, branding and doing digital marketing on the products, and were even provided with production tools for the continuity of their business.
Of course, the AMANAH program initiated by BIN is the best stimulus to realize independent local economic improvement which is supervised or initiated directly by the young people of Aceh, who previously had been trained and educated in such a way by BIN. With the involvement of these youth, it is hoped that Aceh’s economy can improve and community welfare can soon be achieved.
)* The author is a student at Kutaraja Polytechnic.
