Jembrana seeks to improve people's living standard

Jembrana seeks to improve people's living standard

After being elected in 2000, Jembrana Regent Winasa vowed to
enhance his people's living standards by providing, among other
things, free education and health care. The regent has set an
example for other regencies, many of which are still plagued by
corruption and substandard governance. The Jakarta Post's Wahjoe
Boediwardhana shares the Jembrana experience through this special
report.

If you get sick, you don't have to pay for health care. There are
no headaches at the start of the new school year as children
attend school for free. Farmers are subsidized for their produce.

This seems to good too be true, especially for the 221,616
people, most of whom are poor, living in Jembrana, some 100
kilometers west of Denpasar, one of the most impoverished
regencies on the tourist island of Bali.

"This is not a dream. It is the yield of hard work -- a
perfect combination of strong political will to create innovative
programs with a strong commitment to making the program a
reality," concluded a study.

The Jakarta-based Tifa Foundation in cooperation with the
University of Indonesia's Urban and Rural Development Study
Center conducted a comprehensive study on the success story of
Jembrana in properly implementing its programs.

The study reveals encouraging developments.

In 2001, when the program started, the number of poor families
reached 19 percent of the total population. By the end of 2003,
the number of the poor families dropped to only 10.9 percent.
Infant mortality also dropped from 15.5 percent in 2001 to 8.39
percent in 2003.

School dropouts also fell from 0.08 percent in 2001 to 0.02
percent in 2003..

Despite its meager regional budget (Rp 131.1 billion in 2001;
Rp 171.7 billion in 2002 and Rp 193.1 billion in 2003), Jembrana
regional administration was able to implement programs in a
number of vital sectors, including education, health care. It
also offers tax incentives and agriculture subsidies in the form
of incentives and financial support.

Regent Winasa was well aware of the needs of his people.
"Education, health care, human resources development and economic
empowerment are the key to the improvement of the living
conditions of people in Jembrana, many of whom still live under
the poverty line," the regent explained.

Before the program was implemented, the local administration
carried out a study between 2000 and 2001 that revealed that one
out of five elementary school graduates did not continue their
education. The same was true of junior and high school graduates.
Most of the dropouts were unable to continue their schooling
because their parents were too poor to support their education.

Each elementary school class had only 21 students. Half of the
area's elementary schools (200) were dilapidated, and school
teachers' welfare was being neglected.

Members of the community could have participated in various
school renovation projects but were never asked to lend a hand.
Most importantly, Winasa and his team discovered that so much
money had been misused in various sectors that could have been
allocated to improve education.

Winasa took immediate and drastic action in 2001. The regent
merged a number of elementary schools and reduced the number to
create better quality schools in terms of the number of students
to a class and required teachers, effective fund allocations and
better school management systems. By applying these measures,
Winasa's administration saved Rp 3.3 billion per year, which was
consequently used to provide scholarships and subsidies for
educational purposes.

In the last four years, Jembrana has allocated Rp 14.7 billion
(or Rp 3.7 billion per year) to make education free for all.
There are approximately 44,000 school students from elementary to
high school. This number comprises an estimated 19 percent of the
total population.

The result of the program is quite impressive. Currently,
there are almost 8,000 high school students compared to 7,432 in
2001.

"What we need to do is find out the core of the problem and
never introduce quick-fix programs with temporary solutions,"
Winasa explained.

Long before he was appointed regent of Jembrana, he realized
that the government could only improve the living conditions of
the people through providing basic needs, including health care
and education. Winasa is a medical professor at the Udayana
University in Denpasar. He is also a dentist by profession.

The majority of Jembrana residents value the programs as they
have had a direct impact on their daily lives. Sending children
to school or health care centers was not a priority for most poor
families in the regency. Thanks to the programs, they can
envision brighter futures for their children.

The community health care system was also overhauled. "You
can't make any progress in development when your people are
unhealthy and lack education. A healthy society is our first
target to creating better human resources," the regent said.

Winasa canceled all subsidies for the procurement of medicine
and medical equipment for community health centers and state
hospitals. The funds, which amounted to Rp 4.5 billion in 2004,
were instead used to pay health insurance for all natives of
Jembrana.

Through the health insurance system, people holding Jembrana
ID cards and their families are entitled to free health care at
community health centers and local state hospitals.

In the economic sector, the local administration introduced a
revolving fund program to provide loans for farmers, fishermen,
handicraft producers and other small-scale businesspeople using a
profit-sharing system. Since 2001, the local government has
allocated around Rp 20 billion that has benefited 581 out of 1550
community groups.