Regional universities need to focus on their regions

Kees Stigter, Visiting Professor in Africa and Asia, Wageningen University, The Netherlands

Three years ago, Dr. Andi Lolo, cultural attache at the Indonesian Embassy in the Hague, and a staff member of Hasanuddin University, Makassar in South Sulawesi, asked for the attention of Dutch universities for the neglected universities on the eastern Indonesian islands outside Java.

He did so in an interview with Transfer, the Dutch journal on international higher education. Unfortunately this was at a time when in Europe "marketing" started to replace "development issues" in higher education contacts with developing countries. A visit of rectors of these universities to the Netherlands notwithstanding, the reception of these ideas has remained rather cool.

Two years ago, A. Chaedar Alwasilah, a senior lecturer in Bandung, wrote in this newspaper that improving higher education "should account for geographical disparities, which have led to an increasing brain drain for the home provinces." It is therefore understandable, he continued, that most regions are unprepared for regional autonomy. "Improvement should hence be more of a priority in universities outside Java."

Under decentralization, he said, "universities should function as an agent of social and cultural transformation within their own area first."

These ideas merit a follow-up. Funding is required for the establishment of departments or even faculties of natural resources management in the universities of neglected provinces.

With the provincial governments considered partners of the universities in regional autonomy, there is ample space for joint ventures with the universities. During visits to several regional universities in Indonesia over the past years, local authorities begged the universities to collaborate with them in performing their new duties related to the management of natural resources in the region. However, clearly also the universities are not ready for this important task.

Yet it has not been considered the task of universities to be partners with the government in problem solving. This was understandable in the establishment phase of universities and also is understandable for the growth of some leading universities here.

However, the task of regional or provincial universities in the present situation should be defined differently.

The experience in Sudan points in that same direction. As a visiting member of staff of the University of Gezira, a leading regional University in Wad Medani, Sudan, we were able to show how challenging problem-oriented research could be at a department of environmental sciences and natural resources within a faculty of agriculture.

Supported by the Netherlands government, we worked in research areas from selecting the best trees for efficient settlement of blown sand to improvements in underground grain storage in cracking clays, and from water waste in modern irrigation practices to designing shelterbelts to halt the desert that is encroaching into irrigated fields in the drying climate. Students scientifically educated with solving such problems remain suitable partners in development, also when they are part of the labor market.

What we need now in Asia is the opposite of what is happening in most of Africa. In Africa the emergency and relief funds have replaced aid for structural development. Chaos and war and economic malaise have replaced hopes for a better future. Natural resources are either unused or sold for the benefit of a small and ravaging elite.

In Asia we need to use natural resources and the human resources for the benefit of all. This demands the use of local adaptive strategies, contemporary knowledge and policy environments. One such policy is more attention to education and human resources development, including higher education.

In Indonesia the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has played a useful role in funding programs in higher education. The next program could be the support of regional Universities in the establishment of departments or faculties of natural resources management.

Leading universities such as the Bogor Institute of Agriculture and Hasanuddin University in Sulawesi have indicated they want to participate in training staff of the regional universities in local natural resources management research.

However, the ADB has so far mainly worked with loans to the Indonesian government for higher education program funding. This appears to be an impediment for further programs of this kind because of the reluctance of the Indonesian government to accumulate new debts through new loans.

If neither the government nor ADB mitigate their policies, which appears unlikely at present, the way out is local funding. A decision in the newly amended Constitution stipulates that centrally as well as regionally 20 percent of the budgets should be used for education.

Though economists say this is not feasible, as far as higher education is concerned, one could well imagine joint ventures of central and regional governments and Universities in establishing education facilities around important themes of natural resources management. These should be established in the regional/provincial Universities.

Some leading universities there and on mainland Java should be involved in local staff development training at the S2 and S3 levels. The subjects of their courses and thesis should strongly pertain to this management of natural resources in participatory approaches with the local people.

This way, expertise and human resources would be built up that could be beneficially used in the regions and could contribute very much to the development of these regions and their inhabitants. This would be educational money very well spent, whether coming from the ADB or local sources.

Prof. Kees Stigter Ph.D. is engaged in experiments in higher education in among others China, Vietnam and Indonesia (Java, Madura, Sulawesi and Lombok).