Many Jakartans made homeless by crisis

JAKARTA (JP): The number of homeless people and urban poor families in Jakarta is relatively high, due to the ongoing economic crisis, according to the latest census.

Data from the 2000 census made available by the Jakarta chapter of the Central Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday reveals that Jakarta had a total of 28,364 homeless people in the city as a whole.

In addition, a total of 85,835 families fell into the "poor family" category, as they were not able to afford proper homes for their families.

Most of these poor families were dependent upon breadwinners that were mostly seamen, fishermen or construction laborers.

Furthermore, a total of 4,518 heads of families were unemployed.

About 63 percent of the total urban poor families, or 54,459, had more than three family members and the rest had only 2 immediate family members.

Most of the poor families resided in North Jakarta, totaling 33,990 families, followed by West Jakarta, with 20,029.

South Jakarta was the area with the lowest number of poor families, having only 8,826, while East Jakarta had 12,624, and Central Jakarta 10,348.

The bureau defines urban poor families as those living in less than 64 square meters of space, and without running water and toilet facilities.

They are also incapable of providing themselves with basic nutritious food and can only afford new clothing once a year.

The bureau, however, did not mention in its report whether the number of homeless and urban poor had increased or decreased from previous years.

The bureau stated only that the population in the capital grew by a meager 0.16 percent per annum over the past 10 years to 8,384,853 in 2000, far slower than the 2.42 percent growth recorded in the 1980-1990 period.

The slowdown in the growth of the population in the 1990-2000 period was caused by a low birth rate and migration of Jakartans to the Bogor, Tangerang and Bekasi areas. (06)