Mortality rate still high: Minister

PEKANBARU: The quality of life for Indonesian women is still rated the lowest among the Association of the South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), with women's death rates during child birth reaching their highest levels.

State Minister of Women's Affairs Sri Redjeki Soemaryoto confirmed the poor quality of life for Indonesian women during a function held in Pekanbaru on Saturday.

She said that mortality rates during labor had reached 373 per 100,000 women each year which equated to about 15,000 deaths.

"The education level of our women is also left far behind compared to that of men. Some 39 percent of women do not go to school and only 13 percent of them have graduated from secondary schools, while only 5 percent have finished university education," said Sri Redjeki.

She explained that 50.3 percent of the total Indonesian population of 210 million were women but only 51.2 percent of that total number could get jobs and even then mostly informal work with low wages. -- Antara