Gunung Kidul withers in heat and dust
Gunung Kidul withers in heat and dust
By Heru Sigit Cahyanto
GUNUNG KIDUL (JP): Toil and trouble has long beset inhabitants of Gunung Kidul in the special administrative district of Yogyakarta, fighting a constant battle to survive on arid land and with scarce water resources.
The regency, located 39 kilometers southeast of the city of Yogyakarta, covers 1,485 square kilometers and consists of three subregions, 15 districts, three subdistricts, 144 villages and 1,431 hamlets. The population is 729,655, with 140,077 heads of household. Population density is 491 per square kilometer.
These people live with general problems of steep mountain terrain, infertile land, poor transportation, limited regional revenue and lack of clean water resources.
Hardest hit in the dry season is the southern region of Pegunungan Seribu, whose name translates as "thousand mountain range".
Conditions have been so depressing that suicide rates are high.
"People really lack water for everyday use," said the regent, Harsadiningrat. "Here, there are neither water resources or rivers, and lakes dry up in the dry season."
Drought and food shortages have been worsened by the dearth of reservoirs and difficulty in finding cattle feed, which has forced people to obtain them from outside.
Farmers also find it hard to acquire seeds for agriculture, because their stock has been sold to cover daily expenses. There is also damage to plant life through the premature felling of trees.
In 1991, a drought in this region hit seven 59 villages and 474 hamlets, affecting 195,931 people. The following year, the drought struck 38 villages and 188 hamlets with 74,172 people.
The local administration supplied clean water to the stricken areas through 11 water trucks making a total of 44 daily trips.
The local budget for the problem totaled Rp 174 million, of which Rp 139.6 million has been used.
A short-term rehabilitation program is the maintenance of the quality of lake-water resources and the provision of rainwater reservoirs. There are 262 lakes, but these dwindle to four in the dry season. There are 27,544 reservoirs in the dry areas, and 8,823 family heads make use of those resources.
A middle-term program includes improvement of clean water services through construction of clean water facilities at a cost of Rp 57.32 billion.
This will ultimately meet the water needs of 349,973 inhabitants in 96 villages.
A long-term program tackles the problem of overused land through rehabilitation and conservation.
Efforts will continue but the results are unclear, particularly for the embattled southern area.
When business tycoon Probosutedjo supplied 100 tons of rice to aid the local population, he said it might be necessary "to build dams to reserve water like in Taiwan".
He also suggested relocating villagers closer to water resources.
Regent Harsadiningrat said earlier the area might better be utilized as a national park, and residents "had better move to the north where clean water resources are more abundant".
These suggestions have yet to be studied to formulate a cohesive program. Until this is done, the struggle of the people of Gunung Kidul will continue.