Govt to focus on education, health in eliminating poverty

Urip Hudiono, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government has reiterated its vow to improve the living conditions of people by raising the quality of public education and health services.

Vice President Jusuf Kalla said on Wednesday all public school buildings and community health centers (Puskesmas) in the country would be up to standard within three years.

"We want to reach a level where no more school buildings are in poor condition and in danger of collapse," he said in his opening remarks at a conference on poverty eradication and the UN millennium development goals.

"Nor will there be any Puskesmas that are short of doctors or medicine," the vice president said.

Minister of National Education Bambang Sudibyo said many school buildings in the country were no longer suitable for educational activities, and that repairing them would require Rp 5 trillion (some $520 million) over the next three years.

"We will find a solution for this financial need to meet our commitment within the time frame," he said.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Office of the Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare and the World Bank, and is being attended by representatives of regional administrations as well as non-governmental organizations.

The UN expects its member countries to achieve the eight-point millennium development goals by 2015. These goals include eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, providing universal primary education, promoting gender equality and empowering women, reducing child mortality rates and improving maternal health.

In its medium-term development program, the government aims to reduce the nation's poverty rate from 36.1 million people -- or 16.7 percent of the population -- in 2004 to 8.2 percent in 2009, with intermediate levels of 15 percent this year and 13.3 percent in 2006.

The government also plans to reduce the jobless rate from 9.5 percent of the workforce in 2003 to 6.7 percent in 2009.

Kalla said that to achieve these goals, sufficient economic growth was required, as well as the funding for the development programs.

The government has targeted average economic growth of 6.6 percent over the next five years, and as for the funding, it plans to increase the tax ratio to 19 percent from the current 12 percent.

However, Coordinating Minister for the Economy Aburizal Bakrie said that even 6.6 percent growth would not be sufficient if the country did not do more to create jobs.

"It would not be enough if every 1 percent of economic growth only created jobs for some 200,000 people," he said, comparing those numbers to the estimated 2.5 million people who enter the job market in Indonesia each year.

According to data from the National Development Planning Agency, every 1 percent of economic growth created employment for 215,000 people from 2000 to 2004. In comparison, 1 percent of economic growth created 370,000 jobs in 1994.

Aburizal said the government wanted to boost economic growth through investment in sectors that created lots of jobs, such as agriculture, construction and trade and services.