Indonesia Wants To Catch Up With Malaysia In Writing For Academic Journals

By Ahmad Fuad Yahya JAKARTA, Feb 27 (Bernama) -- The Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture has offered an explanation on its decision to compel both under- and postgraduate students to write for academic journals as a new prerequisite for graduation. Its minister, Mohammad Nuh, said the decision was made with the aim to let Indonesia catch up with Malaysia, Turkey and China in writing for academic journals. "Why we made it compulsory? Because we want to inculcate the culture of reading, writing, but not plagiarism," he said in Depok, West Java, as quoted by news portal detik.com on Monday. Mohammad said the number of academic journals published in Indonesia was probably the same as the number of academic journals published in other developing countries 10 years ago, but at present, Indonesia had been lagging behind the rest of the countries, especially Malaysia, Turkey and China. He also expressed confidence that if the current 400,000 under- and postgraduate students in Indonesia were to write for such journals, Indonesia would definitely be able to catch up. The new prerequisite is expected to take effect in August. -- BERNAMA