Yogyakarta, August 28th 2021–Students of Fisipol UGM are back with an achievement in the University Student Creativity Program (PKM) by getting a grant for their research. This time, the collaboration is between a student from the Communication Department, Affifatul Millah Nurul Aulia Hidayat, and two members from the Governmental Politics Department, Imron Amrozi and Dicky Riandy Pratama. Their mentor is Amalinda Savirani as a lecturer in the Governmental Politics Department.
The University Student Creativity Program (PKM) is created by the Ministry of Technology and Research to facilitate the potential in Indonesia’s university students to research, develop, and implement knowledge and technologies that they have learned to the wider public. This program is divided into several categories and the culmination of the event is PIMNAS.
In this competition, the team lead by Imron Amrozi used the topic of urban politics with the title “Millenials and Challenges to Urban Development: Gentrification and Commercialization of Space in Yogyakarta”. Starting from their reflection of urban developments, they found that several problems also arise with the development programs. They tried to research how commercialization and the production of mass tourism accommodation space creates a gentrification of tourism in Yogyakarta. Additionally, they also highlight the cross generational impact of gentrification towards the local citizens which have to do with the scarcity of housing in Yogyakarta.
Through their research they found that the city of Yogyakarta is the pillar of tourism in the Special Region of Yogyakarta and that has to do with the commercialization of space. The problem of commercialization is pretty complex as well, because non local actors buy a land or apartment in Jogja to invest instead of creating a house or residence. This is worsened by the fact that there is no effort from the local government to control hotel developments in order to maintain the right to the city for all.
Various problems that have to do with space commercialization in the end leads to gentrification, where on one side the price of land increases, and on the other the citizen’s minimum wage is not enough to buy a land. Because of that, millennials are harmed because of this commercialization practice that has gone on for a long time. The topic chosen by the team is a part of the PKM-RSH category or the social humaniora branch. After their proposal is accepted, the research will go on for a couple months and the output will take the form of creative writing, journal, or research report.