Family planning program falters in Kupang

Yemris Fointuna, The Jakarta Post, Kupang

The family planning program in impoverished East Nusa Tenggara has failed to contain a rising birth rate amid reports of widespread malnutrition in the province.

The program, introduced nationally by the New Order government in 1967 with the popular slogan "Two children are enough", seems to have lost some of its effectiveness in the province since 1998, when the country went through a political transition.

The head of East Nusa Tenggara's National Family Planning Board, Soter Parera, blamed the increasing birth rate in the province, which has resulted in a population growth of about 1.79 percent annually, on several factors, including the local practice of placing more value in boys than girls.

"East Nusa Tenggara people still treasure boys as heirs. Even if a family already has three girls, it would still not be enough without a boy. So it is not unusual for a family to have 10 children, including boys who have a higher social status in society," Parera said.

The director of the Kupang City Women's House Foundation, Yuli Ndolu, and Sister Sisilia, an activist at the Women's Caring Forum in Belu regency, criticized the practice of according boys with a higher social status.

"Boys and girls are the same. The maternal mortality rate in East Nusa Tenggara is among the highest in the country because many women, in the quest for a male heir, are forced to have babies after they are already older or not physically healthy enough to have a baby," Sisilia said.

"The perception that boys are everything for the family is also responsible for restricting girls' rights," Yuli said.

She said the perception also led to the phenomenon of boys enjoying a better education, while girls stayed at home helping their mothers.

According to 2004 data from the provincial family planning board, the infant mortality rate in the province was at 59 per 1,000 births, while the maternal mortality rate was 602 for every 100,000 births.

Nationwide, the infant mortality rate was 35 per ever 1,000 births and the maternal mortality rate was 307 per 100,000 births in 2001.

However, not everyone agrees that boys have a higher social status in the province. A member of the Kupang Bishop's Justice and Peace Commission, Father Florensius Maxi un Bria, said boys and girls were viewed and treated the same, and that the issue had nothing to do with rising birth rates.

He said it was sad that many impoverished families had more than four children, which he said would only compound these families' problems. "The widespread cases of malnutrition in the province is an example."

For example, WZ Johanis Hospital in Kupang is treating a severely malnourished boy who is the 11th child of a poor family in Oesao village, East Kupang district. The 11-year-old boy weighed just 11 kilograms when he first arrived at the hospital three weeks ago. He is now 17 kilograms.

The head of East Nusa Tenggara's Development Planning Board, Umbu Sorung, and the head of Belu regency's Family Planning Office, Valens Pareira, said local administrations planned to reevaluate the family planning program in their regions.

The administrations, they said, also planned to hire more family planning campaigners in remote areas to reach all residents.

"Many of the family planning campaigners have been transferred to other offices. In the future, the administrations will recruit more family planning campaigners to be assigned to villages," Valens said.

A community leader in Soe, Timor regency, Frederik Hendrik Fobia, said government officials, religious figures and activists played an important role in changing perceptions and lowering the birth rate.

"The people should not always be blamed. This is a big challenge for the family planning board. According to local customs, men are the heirs in families," he said.

An Atambua resident, Yoseph Rasi, 46, however, blamed the rising birth rate on people's lack of understanding and access to birth control.

"My wife began using contraception after our second child was born but the pills were not working. We switched to the IUD but that did not work. My wife died when giving birth to our 10th child," said the father of four girls and six boys.