“More small (Australian) businesses go to Fiji than Indonesia. I think Indonesia has traditionally been a closed market,” says Tim Harcourt, chief economist at the University of Technology Sydney. “Generally Indonesia is a bit like the United States or Brazil – they think about the domestic market first rather than a place like, say, Singapore, that’s very much open to trade and investment from the global economies.

“Indonesia was never this low labour cost place that China, Vietnam and Bangladesh were. Indonesia’s all about being a large middle class [that’s fuelling] a domestic economy.”

But that could all be about to change if Jennifer Matthews has her way.

She’s the national president of the Australia-Indonesia Business Council and is evangelising on Indonesia’s new openness in a travelling roadshow across Australia in partnership with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT).

It has visited Darwin in the Northern Territory, which is closer to Jakarta (2,700km) than it is to Canberra (3,100km), and will soon head to Sydney to promote the digital economy.

“The time is right,” she says of accelerating Australian trade with Indonesia to boost jobs in the post-pandemic recovery. “There is definitely an opportunity to grow this relationship. We can see the transformational change that is taking place in Indonesia right on our doorstep.”