Coastal communities need empowerment, Sarwono says

Coastal communities need empowerment, Sarwono says

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia needs to draw up a development model specifically for coastal communities because they have been impoverished by current economic development programs, State Minister of Environment Sarwono Kusumaatmadja said yesterday.

"The exploitation of the coasts and seas tend to ignore the biological diversity, and leads to a decline in income of coastal communities," Sarwono said in a keynote address at a two-day workshop on development models for coastal people.

Ironically, while the sea and coasts contribute to about 22 percent of Indonesia's gross domestic product, the people living in these areas remain poor, he said.

He said such a model should empower coastal communities. Their increased prosperity in turn would encourage them to better safeguard their surrounding environment.

Sarwono said in drawing up the new model, experts have to take into account several factors.

These include the use of natural resources without destroying the environment; partnerships involving the public, government, non-governmental organizations and the business circle; more environmental-friendly methods of exploiting natural resources; the creation of markets for them; and the involvement of coastal communities in safeguarding these resources.

During the workshop, three activists from Sulawesi warned that stereotyping coastal communities has made it even more difficult for people to understand these people.

"Stereotypes lessen our sensitivity to the diverse problems of coastal communities," said Arief Wicaksono, in a paper written together with Moudy Gerungan, both coastal community workers in North Sulawesi.

Before empowerment, the identities of these people must be clear, he said. A study of the familiarity and ability of the local administrations regarding public participation models is also needed, he said.

Local policies on resources related to coasts and coral reefs, spatial plans and access of local people to information on policies and spatial plans are also important in developing community development models, he said.

Sufri Laode from the Institute of Rural, Coast and Societal Studies (LP3M) in Ujung Pandang, South Sulawesi, said different islands have different specializations in their fish-catching technology, a difference which is often ignored in various projects.

Arief quoted a 1990 study on improvement efforts of fishing communities in developing countries, which stated that cooperatives, which is the general approach in Indonesia, are mostly enjoyed by established groups in the community.

Sufri told the workshop that 11 fishing communities in South Sulawesi which they work with have difficulties in reducing dependence on their employers.

"We tried to improve the management of these employers, particularly regarding the administration and access to formal financial institutes," Sufri said.

In the last two years they only managed to convince two of nine employers to cooperate with their organization to improve their managements. (anr)