East Nusa Tenggara remains poor

By Yemris Fointuna

KUPANG, East Nusa Tenggara (JP): East Nusa Tenggara or NTT, the southeast province of 566 islands, has a large wealth of untapped natural resources in its arid land and vast waters.

The people of NTT, or Flobamora, are hospitable and hard working. In the past, owing to its beauty and appeal, the territory was a magnet for westerners in search of spices.

Its unfertile soil, though, has not robbed the archipelago of its various natural wonders and cultural diversity. While other provinces enjoy six months of wet season a year, NTT only has four months of it.

Among its most precious assets are sandalwood, which can be found in Timor and Sumba, the triple-colored Lake Kelimutu in Ende-Flores, Komodo dragons (monitor lizards) in Komodo island and rare canaries in Alor.

Now, 56 years after Indonesia achieved independence, NTT's development continues to be neglected. Social welfare and decentralization have only been a mere slogan inherited from the New Order era.

NTT has been almost unchanged for the past 32 years. Only a few privileged people have enjoyed education.

Of the region's population of 3.9 million who are scattered in an area of 47,349 square kilometers, 80 percent are poor, while an estimated 1.39 million of them are jobless.

The various poverty eradication programs in NTT have been misused by corrupt officials both in Jakarta and in this province. The province has received presidential aid, fuel subsidies, and not to mention grants and assistance from the World Bank, the United States Agency for Development (USAID) and other donor countries. However, a large portion of the funds has gone unaccounted.

NTT's 13 regencies and one municipality, viz regencies of Kupang, Southern Central Timor, Northern Central Timor, Belu, Alor, East Flores, Manggarai, Ngada, Ende, Lembata, Sikka, East Sumba, West Sumba and Kupang municipality, are equally impoverished and disadvantaged in terms of education and health care.

In 1980, NTT's literacy rate was only 65.01 percent. It rose to 81.48 percent in 1997. Today, the number of illiterates here is 376,170; elementary school dropouts, 989,890; those who have completed elementary school, 880,890; those who have completed junior high school, 240,000, those who have completed high school, 155,000; and those with university degrees, 45,762, according to official figures.

The region's lack of qualified human resources considerably affects its development plans. Eighty percent of the people of NTT live in isolated villages. Most of the people in the province's 2,207 villages and 309 subdistricts are involved in agriculture, farming and forestry, but yet find it hard to earn a decent living.

Eres Erasmus Sikki, head of Tunbaun village in Amarasi district, Kupang regency, said the development activities so far had been concentrated in urban areas.

Eres' statement has some truth. For example, it takes between three hours and four hours to reach the hilly Tunbaun, which is only 40 kilometers from the NTT capital of Kupang because the road leading to it is very bumpy. In the wet season, the village, which serves as Kupang's major food supplier, becomes inaccessible by car.

However, roads in the urban areas are tarred and well- maintained. This contrast is, among others, the result of a strategy known as "rural development by urban bureaucrats". Rural development plans were made without seeking inputs from villagers. Thus the rural people did not benefit from the development programs.

The poor infrastructure in rural areas has hampered transportation of agricultural produce from the rural areas to urban markets. Consequently, the children's education is sacrificed because their parent's cannot earn enough money.

Meanwhile, NTT's villagers, whose houses are made of bamboo stems and dried grass, do not live in sanitary surroundings as they share their homes with cattle and poultry.

Infant mortality in the province stands at 47.7 per 1,000 live births and the maternity death rate is 86.0 per 1,000 live births. The life expectancy is 61.8 years for males and 65.6 years for females.

NTT's hilly topography and vast span of islands make access by any mode of transportation difficult. NTT only has 13 general hospitals, 209 public health centers (Puskesmas) and 171 mobile health service units. Hospitals and health facilities are also situated far from rural settlements.

Health personnel is also far too small in number compared to the region's population. NTT only has 212 physicians, 2,381 nurses and 2,397 midwives.

The economic activities of villagers in NTT are far less dynamic than those of people living in urban areas. Although most of NTT's villagers spend the whole day farming or looking after their livestock, they only earn a small amount of money. They sell their produce once a week in the city if transportation is available.

NTT's economic growth rate is only 2.89 percent while its per capita income is Rp 1.3 million a year. NTT's economic plight is real. Some NTT villagers can only afford to eat twice a day of meager portions of nutritionally poor food.