Malls for all?

Jakarta's income per capita is approximately Rp 30 million (around US$3,500) per year. Which explains why, relatively speaking, Jakartans have great purchasing power.

That is the argument used by administration officials to legally allow the establishment of more and more malls, plazas shopping centers, or whatever they are called these days.

Six proposals from investors to build more retail centers this year are indicative of the decision-makers' openness to new shopping centers.

But it seems that 73 shopping malls, six wholesale stores, 116 department stores and 125 supermarkets -- in addition to 151 traditional markets managed by the city's PD Pasar Jaya -- are still not enough for the officials' efforts to educate residents that they should prefer shopping over leisure/educational time in beautiful parks, museums or libraries.

According to Governor Sutiyoso, the city needs more malls. "The indication is clear. The malls are always packed by visitors."

However, Jakarta's income per-capita of Rp 30 million a year is misleading, given that open unemployment in this overcrowded city reaches 700,000 and more than one million families possibly earn less than Rp 1,000,000 a month. So, the figures look rosy thanks to the relatively astronomical incomes of tycoons, businessmen, bankers, city and state officials and other wealthy people living in the capital.

Sutiyoso's hypothesis that crowded malls indicate the people's great purchasing power is also questionable. Data recorded by the administration shows that only 30 percent of mall visitors buy something, while the remaining 70 percent just go stroll around. So, we should be more careful in churning out the data, because many among those 30 percent of buyers may just be buying the basic staples in the mall. Therefore, Sutiyoso's justifying premise is not supported by the real numbers.

Nevertheless, despite some opposition, the building of new malls continues, helped by Sutiyoso's other argument that construction projects, for new malls, will employ more people. In this case, the governor has proven his pragmatism when he said that investors see that the retail business in Jakarta remains competitive. "If the business is no longer promising the investors would stop building."

Things are in fact not that simple. Building more stores, trade centers and malls is indeed diametrically opposed to the basics of education. Parents and teachers and government leaders should encourage children to visit libraries, museums, zoos, city parks and other, more nurturing places where children and youths can develop their creativity.

Surprisingly, in this context is the statement of Sukri Bey, head of the economic administration bureau of Jakarta, who said that shopping malls are the only places where people can go to shop and find recreation, for people to stroll around, or buy something to eat and drink, and nothing else.

We do need malls, but too many malls are not necessary. Too many malls, in fact, may encourage people to become mindless consumers who cannot distinguish between buying something they really need or want, and buying on impulse because they are tempted.

At this point, people have the right to ask the officials how many more trade centers, plazas and malls they want erected while the number of open spaces has been steadily decreasing.

Property consultant PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC) revealed in 2002 that there would be at least 800,000 square meters (about the equivalent of 200 full-size football fields) of new shopping centers in Greater Jakarta between late that year and 2005.

From the environmental point of view, the building of more trade centers or malls is very disturbing. This short-term, revenue-oriented policy is blatantly against the administration's own promised plan to regreen the city and preserve groundwater.

No technical regulations exist governing the distance that is required between one mall and another, an oversight that is not in line with ideal zoning plans.

When it comes to traffic, the construction of more malls and trade centers is proof of the administration's failure and its inability to respond to the whole set of problems the city is facing in an integrated manner.

Traffic flow is apparently the quite a ways down the priority list for the officials when they issue permits for new malls to be erected.

Given all these facts, the indisputable conclusion would be that more malls will only benefit the city in one area -- cold, hard cash. On the other hand the policy will cause innumerable problems -- including diminished education, worsening traffic congestion, drying groundwater supplies and the burgeoning of mindless consumerism.