JAKARTA - Indonesia's two-day Chinese New Year break is projected to generate Rp 9.06 trillion (around $570 million) in economic activity, the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry said in a written statement Monday, February 16.

Sarman Simanjorang, the chamber's deputy chair for regional autonomy, built the estimate from the ground up across four spending categories. 

The country's ethnic Chinese population of roughly 11.25 million people, or about 2.81 million households of four, is assumed to spend Rp 1 million per family on festive meals and the “angpao” tradition of giving cash in red envelopes, accounting for Rp 2.81 trillion. 

Air travel out of Soekarno-Hatta is projected at 1.74 million passengers at an average fare of Rp 1 million each, adding Rp 1.74 trillion. Around 3.36 million people are projected to travel domestically for leisure or family visits at an average of Rp 500,000 per person, contributing Rp 1.68 trillion. Regular rail accounts for close to one million passengers at Rp 150,000 per ticket, or Rp 150 billion. 

Retail adds Rp 2.66 trillion, pegged at 5 percent of the Rp 53.38 trillion the Indonesian Retail Entrepreneurs Association has set as its combined target for Chinese New Year, Ramadan, and Eid al-Fitr in 2026. Toll fees, fuel, and sea transport are excluded from the Rp 9.06 trillion total.

For scale, the same chamber estimated Rp 91.3 trillion circulated during the 2024/2025 Christmas and New Year break. 

But with Ramadan beginning days after this holiday, Sarman said Chinese New Year is the first meaningful consumer spending event of 2026, and a gauge for whether the economy can reach the government's Q1 target of 5.5 percent, against a full-year budget assumption of 5.4 percent.