Luhut's Breakthrough: Distributing Rp 5.4 Million Per Person Using AI

The government is set to employ an Artificial Intelligence (AI) based system to distribute social assistance (Bansos) to the poor and underprivileged. This was revealed by the Chairman of the National Economic Council (DEN), Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, at the Presidential Palace complex on Tuesday (9/6/2026).

He explained that the technology will be utilised to filter and categorise individuals included in the recipient list. Furthermore, he stated that social assistance will no longer be distributed in the form of goods. Instead, it will be channelled as direct cash transfers, with amounts reaching up to Rp 5.4 million per person.

“I see that subsidies will no longer be for goods. Subsidies will go directly to the recipients because we are consolidating all social assistance into cash transfers, and so on, amounting to Rp 5.4 million per person. This will be categorised using AI,” said Luhut.

The use of AI in distribution has already been implemented in a pilot project in Banyuwangi, East Java. The initial programme is claimed to have been successful and is currently being socialised across 42 regencies and cities.

If all these programmes are successful, Luhut revealed plans to launch them nationally this coming October. “We are learning from this model; if these 42 areas are successful, we will roll out nationally across all 514 regencies and cities in October this year, and then I will report to the President,” said Luhut.

Luhut believes the adopted system will provide budget savings amounting to tens or even hundreds of billions of rupiah. Additionally, Luhut announced that the government will launch a single data identity, or Digital Single ID, which will be integrated by the end of this year. This programme is intended to ensure that social assistance becomes more precisely targeted in the future.

“Perhaps by the end of this year, there will be a Digital Single ID, which will result in all social assistance or direct cash transfers being targeted. Therefore, it will be accurate, and that will result in significant savings,” Luhut emphasised.