Indonesia and Malaysia have deepened their pledge to further technical and through the signing of a Letter of Intent (LoI). The pact, signed by the Jakarta and West Sumatra Provincial Administrations and Universiti Kuala Lumpur (UniKL) and Education Malaysia Global Services (EMGS), is intended to encourage technical education opportunities for Indonesian students.
This Letter of Intent seeks to encourage technical and vocational education (TVET) and other technical courses to Indonesian students. With this ecosystem, we seek to offer more educational opportunities to Indonesian students", Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said in a press conference in Jakarta.
Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid emphasized the status of six Malaysian universities under the Malaysia Technical University Network (MTUN), with a focus on engineering and technical courses. The colleges have historically served both local and foreign students, with increasing emphasis on recruiting candidates from Indonesia.
"Our education system, which closely resembles the widely accepted Commonwealth Education System, provides a bilingual mechanism comprising Indonesian, Malay, and English—which places our students at a competitive advantage on the world stage", he says. As an inducement, Malaysian universities provide competitive fees considerably lower than comparable courses in the likes of the United States.
"We will also identify scholarship opportunities, offering desirable discounts for Indonesian students. These incentives render colleges such as UniKL and MTUN attractive options," added Deputy PM Ahmad Zahid, who is the Malaysian Minister of Regional and Rural Development.
Malaysia also intends to raise the figure of its students studying in Indonesia. One destination of choice among Malaysian students is going to be Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB), which is best known for courses in agricultural study.
"So far, about 11,000 Indonesian students are studying at Malaysian universities, and a little more than 2,000 Malaysian students are studying at Indonesian universities. To balance better, we will send more to ITB, especially TVET students who focus on agriculture", Deputy PM Ahmad Zahid added. He noted ITB's growing reputation for studying agriculture and stressed that Malaysia must learn from its experience.
During the same event, Jakarta Deputy Governor Rano Karno said that Jakarta plans to send about 150 students to pursue their studies in Malaysia.
"The process of cooperation has been going on for about a year now. We hope to send more than 150 students to Kuala Lumpur to raise their education levels. Since Jakarta hopes to become a global city, human resources are an absolute necessity", he explained.
According to Malaysia's Ministry of Higher Education, 11,455 Indonesian students were enrolled in Malaysian universities in 2024. EMGS also reported a 28 percent increase in new Indonesian student registrations in Malaysia in 2024 compared to the previous year.
