Mobility Pattern Changes in Indonesia in Response to COVID-19

Abstract

All countries affected by the COVID-19 pandemic have established several policies to control the spread of the disease. The government of Indonesia has enforced a work-from-home policy and large-scale social restrictions in most regions that result in the changes in community mobility in various categories of places. This study aims to (1) investigate the impact of large-scale restrictions on provincial-level mobility in Indonesia, (2) categorize provinces based on mobility patterns, and (3) investigate regional socio-economic characteristics that may lead to different mobility patterns. This study utilized Provincial-level Google Mobility Index, Flight data scraped from daily web, and regional characteristics (e.g., poverty rate, percentages of informal workers). A Dynamic Time Warping method was employed to investigate the clusters of mobility. The study shows an intense trade-off of mobility pattern between residential areas and public areas. In general, during the first 2.5 months of the pandemic, people had reduced their activities in public areas and preferred to stay at home. Meanwhile, provinces have different mobility patterns from each other during the period of the large-scale restrictions. The differences in mobility are mainly led by the percentage of formal workers in each region.