VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

The Indonesian government plans to make mass use of natural gas through the gas network or jargas. This is considered important because natural gas supplied through jargas is more attractive, efficient, clean, and safe amid higher demands of modern society.

Director of Planning and Development of Oil and Gas Infrastructure, Directorate General of Oil and Gas, Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM), Alimuddin Baso said that his party is carrying out a transformation in energy management by accelerating jargas development.

Apart from minimizing the subsidy rate, this step is effective in helping to create an independent society that is and economically strong.

Alimuddin Baso added that the central government has opened cooperation with local governments or private parties, both from domestic and foreign countries, to build a Government and Business Entity Cooperation Scheme with a target that by 2024 there will be built 4 million connections for houses.

The Acting Mayor of Batam, Syamsul Bahrum, welcomed this plan. Syamsul said that the effort to make green energy is in line with the realization of a green city. 

The Batam city government is ready to work together with other parties through Batam Regional Owned Enterprises (BUMD). This preliminary study for 2020 is held in 9 districts and cities in Indonesia, starting from Batam, Palembang, Bandarlampung, Medan, Mojokerto, Pasuruan, Jombang, Cirebon, and Depok. (RRI)

The Health Ministry updated the number of positive cases of Covid-19 in Indonesia on Tuesday by 4,056 cases.

The total of Covid-19 cases in Indonesia to date has reached 311,176 cases, since the announcement of the first case in March.

Meanwhile, recovered Covid-19 patients until Tuesday is 236,437 patients, an additional 3,844 patients recovered in the last 24 hours. The patients are declared recovered after going through the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test.

Death cases due to the virus increased by 121, bringing the total fatalities to 11,374.

Meanwhile, the number of suspects in Indonesia to date is 140,305 cases. (RRI)

President Joko Widodo asked to strengthen the business ecosystem for farmers and fishermen so that their businesses can remain conducive and productive.

"We are strengthening the business ecosystem in an integrated manner," President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) said in a Limited Meeting of the Farmers and Fishermen Corporations in Realizing Economic Transformation from the Bogor State Palace, West Java, on Tuesday.

Therefore, the President asks ministries and agencies to strengthen a conducive ecosystem, especially in efforts to develop farmer and fisherman corporations through preparing supporting regulations in this direction.

"Actually, we have often talked about this, namely exporting farmers and fishermen to increase their standard of living and now in realizing economic transformation," he said.

On the same occasion, the President reminded that amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the agricultural sector has contributed the highest to national economic growth.

In the second quarter of this year, the agricultural sector grew positively by 16.24 percent. The momentum of positive growth in the agricultural sector needs to be maintained, so it has a significant impact on the welfare of farmers and fishermen. (Antaranews)

The blast that devastated large parts of Beirut in August was one of the biggest non-nuclear explosions in history, experts say.

As reported by BBC.com on Monday, the Sheffield University, UK, experts team said the best estimate for the yield is 500 tons of TNT equivalent, with a reasonable upper limit of 1.1 kilotons. This puts it at around one-twentieth of the size of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945.

The team mapped how the shockwave propagated through the city. The group hopes its work can help emergency planners prepare for future disasters.

"When we know what the yield is from these sorts of events, we can then work out the loading that comes from that. And that tells us how to construct buildings that are more resilient," Dr. Sam Rigby from Sheffield's Blast and Impact Engineering Research Group stated

"Even things like glazing, in Beirut, glazing damage was reported up 10km away from the center of the explosion, and the research Group knows falling glass causes a lot of injuries," he said.

The 4 August explosion was the result of the accidental detonation of approximately 2,750 tonnes of improperly stored ammonium nitrate. The blast led to some 190 deaths, as well as more than 6,000 injuries. (BBC)