Waves of Consumerism in Southeast Asia Generation Z
Southeast Asia has remarkable economic growth to support this Gen Z consumerism, 5,5 percent in 2022 according to Asian Development Bank. Picture: Unsplash
The pandemic has caused economic moving to be more digital because of limited access to leave the house. This phenomenon can be seen from the increasing digital activity with the existence of applications that provide all the needs of goods and services in the digital market. In the early quarter before the pandemic, the data taken from 8,652 respondents showed that 48% of fresh groceries purchases were in the digital platform and 44% of digital consumers buying groceries packaged revealing the trend of online buying increased 3 to 4 times from the previous year. The use of the digital platform also increased, taken from 85% of 8,652 respondents spread across Southeast Asia who said they were trying new digital applications to explore new information. In terms of usage intensity, social media occupies 36%, video streaming is 32%, both e-commerce and food delivery are 28% each, and digital payments are 27%. It is interesting that these data indicate the high potential of the digital economy through social media and e-commerce, even the world of advertising in the form of videos. When viewed in terms of age, the survey states that 25-54 years old people spend digital time online shopping and are aged 18-24 on social media and playing online. This growth is driven by the projected working age of 15-64 years in Southeast Asia to grow by 23 million people by 2030, this shows great potential to foster a spirit of consumerism among young people.
The generations who fall into the working age category are the main drivers that need to be considered by non-governmental organizations. The younger generation with a birth span of 1997-2012, this generation is called Gen Z, who are aged 11-26 in 2023. Gen Z is a potential subject to the influence of consumerism that has undergone behavioral changes due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Gen Z is often described as a well-educated generation, which is more stressed and more depressed than the previous generation. They often have great expectations of themselves that are often not satisfied whereas they spend a lot in order to fulfill their satisfaction. These conditions made Gen Z more vulnerable to consumerism as they have so many platforms to fulfill their desire and stand in a working age phase. Southeast Asia has remarkable economic growth to support this Gen Z consumerism, 5,5 percent in 2022 according to Asian Development Bank. This behavior can inherit cultural values that affect the relationship between nations in Southeast Asia, it portrays how social media set a trend on fashion, entertainment sections, and campaigns on green industries.
On the other hand economic growth led to increasing carbon emissions and junk from people's daily consumerism. A 1% rise in GDP results in a 0.5 to 0.8% increase in carbon emissions. This affects how Southeast Asian Gen Z interprets their needs and satisfiers, because needs are universal and satisfiers culturally specific. They tend to buy a lot of unexpected and satisfying purchases to fulfill their consumerism, for example clothing, fast food, processing food, or even new gadgets that actually aren't necessary. Another example, SEA Gen Z tend to buy clothing merchandise, fast food, or things that are correlated to KPop members, they search it from social media or even buy it online from other countries to fulfill their needs and satisfaction. These manufactured things can bring industrial waste, even personal purchases would bring waste also like from packaging itself. Consumerism changed the cultural values of a nation, these can be seen from many Indonesian Gen Z replacing their basic needs from their ancestor culture. Basic needs like clothing, food, and houses have changed to not living a decent living rather to overliving to fulfill their satisfaction. This change occurred because it was driven by imported goods from other countries, this is how consumerism can affect culture and economical values.
References
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Kallis, G. (2019, March 11). A Green New Deal Must Not Be Tied to Economic Growth. Truthout. https://truthout.org/articles/a-green-new-deal-must-not-be-tied-to-economic-growth/
Statista. (2022, March 25). Leading product types purchased online among Gen Z SEA 2022, by country. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1298512/sea-top-products-purchased-online-by-gen-z-by-country/