How monetary crisis affects East Nusa Tenggara people

By Yacob J. Herin

MAUMERE, East Nusa Tenggara (JP): As a result of the monetary crisis the prices of goods, particularly imported ones, have soared. In a situation like this, wearing imported clothes has definitely become a luxury.

However, clothes imported from Singapore sell very well at traditional markets here. No wonder, they are second hand.

A used T-shirt, that would cost Rp 25,000 (US$2.40) new, is obtainable for Rp 7,500. A used Levi's short-sleeved shirt, sold for between Rp 35,000 and Rp 40,000 when new, is yours for between Rp 15,000 and Rp 17,000.

Siti Amina, a resident of Beru village, Sikka district, said she has frequented this flea market for quite a long time. She usually buys children's wear.

"You can have used dresses, trousers and shirts, still in good condition, at low prices," she said.

Peter Lie, 45, who sells used clothes in Beru, said that he usually takes a sailboat to Singapore to buy the clothes. The round trip takes a month but he considers the effort rewarding as he can make a handsome profit from the business.

He said he bought a bag of used clothes for about Rp 250,000. Back in Maumere each bag goes for Rp 1.5 million. Each bag contains a miscellany of clothing, such as shirts, men's undershirts, shorts, jackets and dresses. Sometimes you can even find blankets and mosquito nets.

"We have never experienced a crisis. We always have goods to sell," he said.

Pelipus, 54, also of Beru village, said that there is no monetary crisis for residents of the town of Sikka when it comes to holding wedding parties. When anyone throws a wedding party, the expenses are borne jointly by the parents of the bride and the bridegroom and by all their family members and relatives.

"Even if the expenses for a wedding party add up to, say, Rp 5 million, these will not be burdensome for the host," he said.

At present it is the season of festivities in Maumere and this usually lasts until August or sometimes even through October. Most are wedding parties. Grasia, another resident of Beru village, for example, held a wedding party for her child recently. She planned to throw a lavish party. However, owing to the squeeze of the monetary crisis she kept the numbers down to 300.

In Maumere and its environs, a party for 500 to 1,000 guests used to cost Rp 4 million to 5 million. But owing to the monetary crisis, the number of guests is now usually reduced to a mere 100 to 200 people, thereby reducing the cost of holding the party to between Rp 1 million and 2 million.

Ivory

In the festive atmosphere of a party nobody seems to mention the pinch of the monetary crisis. However, things are not that bright. Many people are suffering money trouble with patients at Elizabeth Hospital in Lela, some 20 km to the south of Maumere, being among the worst.

Deputy head of the hospital, Sister Agnes Kress, said that many patients leave ivory pieces as security on their discharge from the hospital because they are short of cash.

"They will return when they have the money to pay the bills. When they do, we will return their ivory," she said.

According to Sister Agnes, before the monetary crisis began last July, only a handful of patients left ivory as security. Today more and more do so.

Almost every family in Flores, particularly in Sikka and East Flores districts, has three or four pieces of ivory. The commodity is invaluable to them. When they are proposed to, most girls in Flores get ivory from their future husband.

Ivory indicates one's social status. The more ivory pieces one has, the higher the social status.

Ivory costs between Rp 1 million and Rp 1.5 million a kilogram. Before the onset of the monetary crisis it was sold for between Rp 700,000 and Rp 800,000/kilogram.

People usually pawn their ivory only when they are really hard pressed. Most people's current fragile situation can be gauged from the great number of people crowding the pawnshop in Maumere. Some of them pawn their gold jewelry as well as their ivory, the cash is spent on food and sending their children to school.

Maria, 35, a fisherman's wife, sad that she has been compelled to go to the pawnshop to meet her family's daily needs.

She said that she needed Rp 10,000 to buy enough rice for several days.

"Two days later my husband will get money from his fish catch. Then I will return this money," she said, showing a Rp 10,000 banknote.

The monetary crisis keeping Indonesia in its grip for the last 10 months has also brought suffering to rural people. They are short of cash to buy daily needs.

Every year Sikka district is threatened with a food shortage. The district's population is 254,000 people, most of whom live in rural areas and rely on rice farming as their only means of livelihood. Unfortunately, the rainy season last only three months here.

Regis Geroda, 45, a Nanga Rasong villager, said that he and his fellow villagers have begun to feel the pinch of the crisis. Last year the harvest of his one hectare of farmland produced only four sacks of rice and corn, insufficient to feed a family of five for a year.

Regis says he has borrowed a sack of rice from one of his neighbors and will return to this neighbor two sacks of rice after the next harvest.

Sikka district head, Aleks Idong, admitted the food crisis but denied that any of his people were suffering that much.

"I'm very sure that the people in this area still have stocks of rice and corn."

E.P. Da Gomez, a local observer of economic and social affairs and a former regional legislator from Sikka district, said that many of the people's suffering and hardship is the result of local administration officials' involvement in collusion and corruption.

When asked to comment on the bumper harvest initiated by the minister of agriculture at the invitation of Sikka district head, he said that this bumper harvest was engineered only to prove that there had been no harvest failure in Sikka district.

"It was only a trick. The lack of rain caused many people in Sikka district to experience harvest failure," Gomez added.