Pramuka island residents feel a bitch of misery

< Text and photo By Rudi Madanir -- 10 pts Metrolight

PRAMUKA ISLAND (JP): How does it feel to be born poor and spend the rest of your life being poor?

Amiadi and Asmara, a couple living on Panggang Island of the Seribu Islands, are so poor they sometimes have to make do with boiled rice since they cannot afford anything else. Even then the rice is government rationed.

The couple, who have been married for four years, work together to try to make ends meet. Asmara, 22, earns the family's income by doing laundry for their better-off neighbors. Her disabled husband Amiadi pitches in by ironing clothes because that is all he can do.

When work is available, the couple earn between Rp 3,000 (US$1.39) and Rp 5,000 a day.

"But there aren't always clothes to wash," said Amiadi, 24.

Times are especially trying when none of their neighbors bring clothes for washing because they cannot go to sea and thus have no money to spare for such a luxury.

Amiadi became disabled years ago, and is now confined to a large wooden table specially designed for him. The table, which is set on the terrace of their home, is the only place available for him to perform his activities.

The Seribu Islands, stretching from between 10 and 70 kilometers north of mainland Jakarta, cover a total land area of 1,180 hectares and a water area of 69 square kilometers. Only 11 of the islands are inhabited, and these have a total population of 14,868 people.

Seribu islanders typically rely on fishing for their livelihood. Even for those without physical disabilities, fishing is a difficult business. The islanders are only able to take to the sea during seven months of the year, from April to October, when the weather obliges. The rest of the year is dominated by the west monsoon.

"When the westward seasonal wind comes and triggers giant waves, nobody can go fishing," said Anwar, head of administration affairs of the Seribu Islands district.

This wind, locally called musim barat, has forced the government to support the islanders by supplying them with rice when the weather prevents them from earning money through fishing.

"We call the ration beras musim barat, the monsoon rice," said Anwar, one of the few Panggang islanders with a university degree.

Constraint

This natural constraint has forced the islanders to make seven months of income last for the entire year, and the result is poverty.

Indeed, poverty has always beset inhabitants of the Seribu Islands. And yet the 106 islands which make up the North Jakarta archipelago are also home to some of Jakarta's wealthiest people who spend weekends and holidays at their luxury beach houses there.

According to the National Development and Planning Agency (Bappenas), four of the 11 subdistricts rated as the "most underprivileged" in Jakarta lie among the islands. This means that all four of the subdistricts there, which come under a single Seribu Islands district, are rated as the poorest.

Of the four, the Kelapa Island subdistrict, the farthest from Jakarta, has the lowest percentage, or 26.4 percent, of families, rated as poor.

The Untung Jawa subdistrict, the one nearest Jakarta, is rated the poorest, with 216 of a total of 276 families living below the government-determined poverty line.

"It is surprising that the distance between the subdistricts and Jakarta does not correspond to the percentage of the poor," observed Anwar.

The other two subdistricts, Tidung and Panggang, have 343 (36 percent) and 307 (40.3 percent) poor families, respectively.

The most recent study revealed that the average Seribu Islands housewife has only Rp 7,000 (US$3.33) each month with which to feed and clothe her family. In contrast, families must spend Rp 7,500 per month simply to finance the schooling of their high school-age children.

According to Anwar, a family of four is classified as poor if it spends below Rp 3,000 daily, which is considered the standard for the minimum physical requirements there.

"This means that the islands' poverty line corresponds to a daily expenditure of Rp 750 per person," he said, adding that a total of 1,195 out of 3,223 families on the Seribu Islands spend less than Rp 3,000 a day.

Extravagance

But there are times when nature is generous.

Monthly incomes of between Rp 300,000 and Rp 400,000 are possible for most fishermen if mother nature cooperates.

"Once a crew earned Rp 700,000 from a single fishing trip," recalled Kasno, deputy to the Seribu Islands district head, recently.

The money, however, does not last long.

He said when the going is good during harvest time, when the weather holds, the fishermen can catch as many fish as they want.

Not known as savers, the Seribu Islanders then live it up.

Wedding parties take place all across the islands soon after the end of the harvest, which is usually followed by the notorious west monsoon season, Kasno said.

"We call it the wedding of the west monsoon season and the islanders spend all the money they've earned," he added.

Many islanders travel to the mainland on shopping sprees while others build permanent houses.

It is indeed difficult to spot the simple, bamboo houses a visitor expects to see on the islands because being poor in the Seribu Islands does not translate into living in bamboo huts.

Although more than 300 families living in the Pramuka and Panggang Islands are labeled as poor, it is hard to pick out any huts on both islands.

"They have permanent houses but not permanent incomes," said Anwar.

The islanders' extravagant lifestyle has been blamed for perpetuating their poverty. Instead of saving some of their income for times of trouble, they spend it almost as soon as they earn it.

As a result, many are forced to borrow from loan sharks, which serves to institutionalize their pennilessness.

Land sale

This vicious cycle of poverty has forced many islanders to sell their land to mainland Jakartans, and now an increasing number of islanders live on ever-shrinking plots of land.

The majority of the uninhabited islands are already in the hands of the nation's tycoons, the city administration or government institutions.

"One hectare of Tidung Island's total of 12 has been sold to a mainland Jakartan," declared Zulkifly, a chairman of a youth organization on the island, during a meeting with North Jakarta Mayor Suprawito late last month.

He urged the mayor not to allow another land appropriation in the future due to the limited amount of land owned by locals.

Zulkifly added that he was deeply concerned by the recent trend of mainland Jakartans acquiring large chunks of land from the poor islanders.

"You can imagine what will happen if this continues," he told The Jakarta Post.

IDT

As one of the country's poorer areas, the Seribu Islands are included in the poverty elimination program which started this month. The government has allocated a special presidential fund called the IDT for this purpose.

However, many people are ill-prepared for the campaign.

"Please postpone the program until we are ready to make use of the presidential funds, otherwise the money will be wasted," implored Zulkifly, a Tidung islander.

Asmara has also been chosen as one of the recipients of the Rp 250,000 aid package presented to each person as working capital.

Yet, she claimed "to have no idea" what she would do with the money.

The idea of IDT funding itself is a good one. However, extending the IDT funds to combat poverty in the islands may not be sufficient.

The government's program under the poverty elimination campaign includes workshops on fisheries such as fishing methods, aqua culture and post-catch handling methods, which are all aimed at helping provide the fishermen with access to a permanent income.

The programs, although necessary, are just the tip of the iceberg. The lack of public facilities such as regular public transportation, telecommunications, markets and banks, to name but a few, should be given first priority in combating the local poverty.

Mayor Suprawito also stressed the need for the islanders to alter their extravagant lifestyles and save the money they earn.

Unless they are able to successfully make this lifestyle adjustment, the Seribu islanders will most likely find it difficult to extricate themselves from the grip of poverty.