Nusantara is another name of Indonesia, because Indonesia is made up of 17,508 islands. Nusantara means sea-separated islands or nations separated by sea. The vastness of area itself made Indonesia attractive for both domestic and foreign tourists. Many of them have a plan to get around Indonesia and enjoy the natural beauty and diversity of its flora and fauna in each Indonesian region they visit.
Indonesia lies along 3,977 miles from the Indian Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. This makes Indonesia has a vast seas which is around 3,273,810 km'. Indonesian sea border follows international law of the sea, territorial sea as long as 12 nautical miles and exclusive economic zone as long as 200 nautical miles. The vastness of the Indonesian seas brings blessing to the nation. There is so much natural resource contained in the seas and it can be used for the welfare of the Indonesian people.
Indonesia has a beautiful natural structure. The shape of the islands, if we see from the map, has uniquely beautiful shape. Well, our marine tourism potential is highly diverse and the beauty value is unmatched all over the world.
Unfortunately, our nation's marine beauty potential has not been fully utilized or opti mally managed yet. There are many obstacles that come, from government policy, funding factor, lack of socialization and so on.
Then, a special and a beautiful strategy are needed to make Indonesian islands to be pretty polished so that it will provide benefits to the nation. It is time for all parties to imple- ment the strategy and collaborated.
Therefore, Sustainable Island Development Initiatives (SIDI) presents with the aim to contribute for the development of the concept of sustainability for small islands. In order to achieve that objective, SIDI serves as an umbrella that covers a variety of research and implementation of multi-disciplinary activi- ties, because there are many aspects which need to be considered in the development of small islands, ranging from energy, economic, environmental, social, to educational problems.
This SIDI profile book is created to provide an overview of SIDI and its programs that was, is being, and will be conducted for the fit purpose. In implementing its programs, the cooperation of all parties is necessary. In this context, cooperation with the central govern- ment, local government, industries, universi- ties and the communities is formed into a working group to facilitate work processes which is designed together.
With the presence of SIDI, it is expected that management of small islands in the Indonesia can run maximally.