Eleven poor provinces need urgent action

Eleven poor provinces need urgent action

YOGYAKARTA (JP): An expert says the future poverty alleviation
program should concentrate on areas with the poorest communities
in eleven provinces.

According to Mubyarto, the assistant to the State Minister of
National Development Planning, the provinces include seven in
eastern Indonesia -- West Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, West Nusa
Tenggara, East Nusa Tenggara, East Timor, Maluku and Irian Jaya
-- and four in western Indonesia, namely West Java, Central Java,
Yogyakarta and East Java.

An average of 20 percent of the population, or 3.8 million
people, in eastern Indonesia is poor.

"These regions need special support, and social and physical
infrastructure development," said Mubyarto.

He said in West Kalimantan 21.99 percent of the population, or
820,500 people, are poor; in South Kalimantan 14.33 percent or
424,300 people; West Nusa Tenggara 17.62 percent or 653,000
people; East Nusa Tenggara 20.57 percent or 749,000 people; East
Timor 31.15 percent or 267,000 people; Maluku 19.47 percent or
417,000 and Irian Jaya 21.17 percent, or 427,800 people.

In a discussion at Hotel Garuda here Monday, Mubyarto said the
poorest provinces in Java needed special monitoring because
although the percentage is lower -- 12 percent of the population
-- the absolute number is higher, 12.5 million people or 56
percent of the total number of poor people in the country.

Central Java has the highest number of poor people with 4.16
million people or 13.91 percent of its population; East Java has
four million or 11.86 percent; West Java 3.96 million or 9.87
percent; and Yogyakarta has 303,800 poor people or 10.42 percent
of the population.

Mubyarto, who is also a professor of rural economics at the
Gadjah Mada University, said the number of poor people in
Indonesia had been decreasing by 1.1 million annually from 1993
to 1996 through government aid for the least-developed villages,
known as IDT.

He predicted that in eight years the number of poor people
would decrease by two million annually.

Separately, in a discussion in Jakarta Tuesday, researcher
Juni Thamrin from the Center for Social Analysis said the
government should help instill a feeling of security for
activists working for poverty alleviation at the grassroots.

He also called for dialogs on equal footing between the
government and activists of non-governmental organizations (NGOs)
working for the same cause.

Thamrin was speaking at a seminar held by the Indonesian
Institute of Science's Center for Economic and Development
Studies in cooperation with the UN-ESCAP in Bangkok.

The director of the Center for Economic and Development
Studies, Carunia Mulya Firdausy, said that allowing NGOs to
maintain their independence in their operations and avoid turning
them into agents of the government would promote genuine
cooperation between the government and NGOs.

"NGOs should be viewed as partners in promoting the poverty
alleviation policy and not as instruments of the government for
the implementation of the poverty program," Carunia said. (23/09)