KAI Archives Preservation: Preserving the History of Indonesia’s Railway System
KAI is a state-owned enterprise responsible for managing and operating railway services in Indonesia. As part of Indonesia’s cultural heritage and railway history, KAI has a strong commitment to archive preservation as a valuable source of information and national heritage.
The management, storage, and maintenance of both dynamic and static documents are essential parts of this effort. To address document management challenges, KAI established the Corporate Document Management Unit as an implementation of Law No. 43 of 2009 concerning Archives.
Vice President of Public Relations KAI, Joni Martinus, stated that in managing archives, KAI is committed to optimizing corporate archival governance in accordance with applicable norms, standards, procedures, and archival criteria, while also implementing ISO 9001:2015 Quality Management System since 2012 and ISO 30301:2019 Records Management System since 2022.
“This aligns with the company’s vision and mission as well as continuous improvement efforts,” said Joni.
The types of archives managed by KAI include general/non-record archives, books, new media, electronic records, asset ownership documents, legal documents, land certificates, sale and purchase agreements, inactive records, and archives created from the Rail Document System (an electronic correspondence and archiving application used by all KAI employees).
“The archival collection owned by KAI from the Dutch East Indies era until today is around 3 million records,” Joni said.
He further explained that these archives require special facilities and infrastructure, with attention to security access, safety, cleanliness, temperature, humidity control, and certified human resources. To manage such a large volume of documents, KAI regularly provides archival training to its employees in collaboration with the National Archives of the Republic of Indonesia (ANRI), the National Archives of the Netherlands (NAN), educational institutions, and other archival agencies.
In support of digital transformation, since 2010 the Corporate Document Management Unit has continuously carried out digitization and restoration of conventional archives, photo collections, audio, and video materials to improve accessibility and prevent damage or loss of records. In addition, the Rail Document System application has been developed to facilitate corporate archive management as part of modernizing office administration and archival systems.
Archival reduction is also routinely carried out in accordance with retention policies and applicable regulations. The process of transferring and destroying inactive archives is done for efficiency, while the transfer of static archives to archival institutions supports the preservation of the nation’s collective memory.
In recognition of its archival management excellence, in 2022 the Corporate Document Management Unit received archival unit accreditation with an AA (Excellent) rating from ANRI and was also certified under ISO 30301:2019 by TUV-SUD.
KAI has also received several prestigious awards from ANRI, including 1st place in the National Best Archival Unit category for SOEs in 2017, 1st place National Archival Officer (Non-Civil Servant category) in 2016, and 2nd place in 2017. In addition, over the past four years, the unit has hosted 74 institutional visits, serving as a role model in archival management.
This achievement demonstrates that the company has exceeded standards in archive preservation. It also reflects KAI’s efforts to preserve Indonesia’s railway history so that it remains accessible to current and future generations.
These achievements motivate the company to continue improving its archival preservation efforts. KAI is committed to expanding archive accessibility through digitization and collaboration with other institutions.
“We hope that good archival governance will improve company competitiveness and demonstrate a real contribution to transforming into a more advanced organization,” concluded Joni.
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