Shaping Ideas into Impact—Elghafiky Bimardhika’s Academic and Professional Journey
Elghafiky Bimardhika—known as Fiky—decided to pursue a Masters degree driven by a desire to understand how economic research could address real-world development challenges and improve people’s lives. After working at J-PAL Southeast Asia, he completed a Master of International and Development Economics at the Australian National University (ANU) in 2024. He now applies his experience to research, organisational leadership, and policy engagement in Indonesia.
Making the most of his academic experience
Fiky applied for the Australia Awards Scholarship in 2019, but the COVID-19 pandemic delayed his departure until 2022. During this period, he continued developing his research experience and refining his professional goals. At ANU, he found a program closely aligned with his interests in development economics and public policy. The program strengthened his understanding of economic policy while encouraging him to connect academic concepts with practical development challenges.
“I was targeting this program specifically. The Master of International and Development Economics at ANU matched what I needed, both in terms of content and timing,” he recalled.
His experience in Australia was shaped by an active and practical learning environment. Rather than relying solely on lectures, ANU encouraged students to engage critically with course materials, develop independent perspectives, and communicate their findings. Guest lectures on sustainability, resource management, climate change, and energy broadened his understanding of development policy. With Australia Awards support, he also attended coding workshops in Python and R, building data-analysis skills that remain central to his research and professional work.
Alongside his coursework, Fiky contributed to research addressing important social and economic issues in Indonesia. In 2023, he worked with a PhD student on an Asian Development Bank Institute-supported study examining the effects of volcanic eruptions on children’s education and long-term wellbeing. The research found that natural disasters can reduce school participation, increase the likelihood of early entry into the labour market, and raise risks related to child marriage and health. The study was published in the Economics of Education Review and adapted into a more accessible article for The Conversation. He also contributed to the 2025 Indonesia Update at ANU, helping synthesise research on public opinion, climate change, and development narratives. This work is being developed into a book chapter.
Returning to Indonesia
After returning to Indonesia in 2024, Fiky took on a leadership role at Communication for Change (C4C), a Jakarta-based strategic communication consultancy focused on social advocacy, public policy, and civic space. In 2025, he was appointed Executive Director of Bahana, C4C’s sister organisation specialising in research on public opinion, development, and behaviour change. His responsibilities now extend beyond technical research to setting organisational direction, identifying research gaps, developing research agendas, and designing projects that respond to policy needs.
With assistance through the Australian Alumni Grant, Fiky updated his Master’s thesis on the impact of Indonesia’s 2003 labour law on child labour, education and long-term outcomes. The grant enabled him to return to Australia to present at the International Population Conference in Brisbane.
“What I gained from Australia was not only knowledge, but also a way of thinking, how to approach problems, how to collaborate, and how to position research so it can have real impact,” he reflected.
Fiky’s research connections with Australia have continued. He is preparing a paper for submission to the 2026 Australian Development Economics Workshop at ANU and remains involved in collaborative research with Australian academics, including a three-year project on democracy and civil society with Professor Aurelia Ananda of Griffith University.
