Lack of infrastructure, skilled workers hamper remote regions

Lack of infrastructure, skilled workers hamper remote regions

Rita A. Widiadana, The Jakarta Post, Nusa Dua, Bali

Toli-Toli and Nabire, remote regencies in Central Sulawesi and
Papua respectively, lack infrastructure and qualified human
resources to develop their abundant natural resources and
cultivate democracy as required by the regional autonomy law.

The two regencies are typical of hundreds of remote regencies
that are rich in natural resources.

Nabire, with a population of 116,357, has huge potential in
agriculture, forestry, mining and marine resources but still
faces numerous hurdles in implementing autonomy due to a dearth
of infrastructure and qualified human resources.

Nabire Regent Anselmus Petrus Youw said at an exposition on
regional autonomy here on Thursday that the regency depended
heavily on traditional transportation, as well as on missionaries
who operate small planes to reach remote areas in the regency.

He said the central government had granted special autonomy to
Papua and allotted the province a bigger share of proceeds from
natural resources, but most indigenous people had yet to
understand what special autonomy was.

"We have pressed the central government and provincial
administration to speed up the development of sea and land
transportation to end the regency's isolation and to accelerate
development in all sectors in the regency," he said.

He said he had placed priority on development in health,
education and transportation to help the regency catch up with
developed regencies.

Marthen Waibusi, chairman of Nabire's expo delegation,
insisted that Nabire needed more funds to develop its human
resources, infrastructure and natural resources.

"We have a 10-year Kenyang (Full and Nutritious), Sehat
(Healthy) and Pintar (Smart) Program that ends in 2010," he said,
adding that by then the regency's human resource would be better
able to manage their own resources.

"It is a transitional period, and we still have to learn a lot
about how to manage our abundant resources," he said.

Total plantation land in Nabire covers 69,202 hectares
consisting of 4,771 hectares (4 percent of the total) in small-
scale plantations and 64,521 hectares in large-scale plantations.

Anselmus said that in the plantation subsector, the regency
produced valuable commodities such cacao, coconuts, coffee,
cloves, kapok, cinnamon, cashew nuts, pepper, vanilla and
sugarcane. Total production from these commodities reach a total
of 1,458 tons.

The regency also has enormous potential in marine and fishery,
with 690,750 hectares of sea area, more than 139,300 hectares of
swampy land and 113,975 hectares of river areas.

The annual potential of fish production is estimated at 1,1
million tons. The maximum sustainable yield from the sea is 5,400
tons with a utilization rate of only 2.26 percent.

Fishpond production is 20,000 tons annually with a utilization
rate of only 19.44 percent and freshwater cultivation of 17,241
tons with a utility rate of only 5.26 percent. The production of
fish is targeted to meet the demands of the domestic market as
well as the export market to Japan, Singapore, the United States
and other countries.

Like other regencies in Papua, Nabire has extremely
unexploited mining deposits throughout its subdistricts such as
in Yaur (quartz sand, granite and marble), Napan (gold), Nabire
(gold), zinc, kaolin, gold and copper.

In addition, Nabire also has a number of big rivers such as
Siriwo, Cemara, Otowa and Wanagar rivers that can be used to
generate enough electricity to meet the power demand in the
province.

Contribution from the forestry sector reaches around Rp 1.8
billion resulting from profit of forestry resources and Rp 733
million from the reforestation fund.

"The regency is open for investment opportunities, especially
for foreign investors in the plantation and mining sectors," he
said.

Meanwhile, M. Yunus Hamid, head of the trade and industry
office in Toli-Toli regency, explained that although the regency
was an isolated area, it had a large variety of plantation and
forestry resources that had yet to be managed and utilized
optimally.

"Currently, Toli-Toli is the largest producer of cloves in
Sulawesi, but the sharp price fluctuation has caused our farmers
great losses," he said.

The regency produced 3,440,770 tons of cloves in 2001. In the
last few years, the price of cloves was Rp 80,000 per kilogram,
but has since dropped to Rp 20,000 per kilogram because of the
flood of cloves imported from abroad by cigarette companies in
Java, he said.

The regency also has other profitable commodities including
coconut wood, rattan and other forestry products.

"But, we don't have enough infrastructure to support our
industry. We can only send raw material of lower value to areas
in Java, Bali and some overseas countries," he said.

Lack of transportation facilities including roads and harbors,
as well as processing plants are the main obstacles presently
faced by Toli-Toli in developing its natural resources.

"I really hope that through the expo, we can attract more
investors to our regency so that we can also improve the welfare
of our people," he said.