East Indies East Indies The East Indies or the Indies are the lands of South and Southeast Asia. In a more restricted sense, the Indies can be used to refer to the islands of Southeast Asia, especially the Indonesian Archipelago and the Philippine Archipelago. The name "Indies" is derived from the River Indus and is used to connote parts of Asia that came under Indian cultural influence. Dutch-occupied colonies in the area were known for about 300 years as the Dutch East Indies before Indonesian independence, while Spanish-occupied colonies were known as the Spanish East Indies before the American conquest and later
Batavia, Dutch East Indies new port. In 1885, the port of Tanjung Priok was finally completed, replacing the centuries-old Sunda Kelapa, which was deemed as inadequate for a long time. This would then significantly increase commercial and tourism in Batavia and the Dutch East Indies in general. The Dutch cultuurstelsel, or cultivation system, was a Dutch government policy in the mid-nineteenth century which required a portion of agricultural production to be devoted to export crops. Indonesian historians refer to it as tanam paksa, enforcement planting. The abolition of the cultuurstelsel in 1870 led to the rapid development of private enterprise in the Dutch Indies.