“Islamic boarding schools as educational institutions have a very central role in the socio-culture of Indonesian society. The pesantren has progressed a lot. It is able to develop without losing its characteristics and there are many kinds of independent businesses developed by this pesantren," said Prof. Sudarso. He added that in its development, Islamic boarding schools through cooperatives and MSMEs began to take advantage of e-commerce to expand the range of products and services.

As the first speaker, M. Anwar Bashori, Chair of the Department of Islamic Economics and Finance, Bank Indonesia, explained the role of Bank Indonesia in developing e-commerce based in Islamic boarding school business. “We have a sharia business empowerment program in Islamic boarding schools, which over the past three years have developed 323 Islamic boarding schools throughout Indonesia,” he said. Then he added that Bank Indonesia not only helped financially but also provided assistance in the form of mentors.

The webinar also presented the CEO of Al Ittifaq Modern Islamic Boarding School Cooperative, Agus Setia Irawan. In his presentation, he shared a story about how the Al Ittifaq Islamic boarding school develops business in the pesantren. “Al Ittifaq develops an agricultural business based on the Internet of Things (IoT) so that when watering plants and fertilizing is enough just with a click on Android. What Al Ittifaq has done is tried to share with other Islamic boarding schools. Although there are some struggles, these pesantren have a strong will,” he added.

In his presentation, Agus also emphasized that the students did not only learn the science of fiqh, but the pesantren also built capacity building, business processes, as well as innovation and technology.

The next speaker, Wawan Dhewanto, Ph.D., as an SBM-ITB lecturer, explained the business opportunities of an e-commerce-based Islamic boarding school. These opportunities include Indonesia's large demographic bonus, large market, digital economy, and e-commerce trends that show significant developments. “The market already exists and there are many opportunities, also the students tend to master current technology, the pesantren can do business according to the needs of the students or the capabilities of the pesantren,” he said.

The last speaker, Iqbal Muslimin, CEO of Evermos, described Social Commerce as the economic empowerment of Islamic boarding schools.”Here there is an interesting potential where a fellow in pesantren can connect with one another. So for example the pesantren in Ciwidey have strength in agribusiness, then there are other pesantren in Garut that are strong in fisheries, so they should be able to supply each other in the same ecosystem,” he said. He highly emphasized the importance of the ecosystem that is created together in which there is a collaboration between the fellow of pesantren.  

Reporter: Deo Fernando (Kewirausahaan, 2018)

Translator: Evita Sonny (Management, 2017)