Religious leaders urged to back family planning

Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Confronted with increasing population growth figures, President Megawati Soekarnoputri appealed to religious leaders on Monday to take part in promoting the family planning program.

Speaking at the opening ceremony of the National Family Planning Coordinating Agency (BKKBN) meeting, Megawati said that the movement needed to be revitalized.

"Religious leaders should explain to the people that a child is God's greatest gift and that we have the responsibility to ensure their wellbeing," Megawati said.

She further expressed suspicion that the country's population may be higher than the statistics showed.

According to data issued by the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), the country's population now stood at 210 million, with population growth of 1.5 percent or around three million every year.

Fears of a population explosion have loomed large as the number of family planning participants dropped significantly after the down fall in 1998 of the New Order regime, when everyone was ordered to join the program.

BPS statistics showed that contraceptive use dropped by 20 percent last year compared to 1997, when 71.72 percent of married couples across the country used some sort of contraception.

Megawati added that having too many children would make it difficult for the parents to provide for their basic needs.

"It is not an easy job to build and improve the quality of our human resources with such large numbers," she said.

She said that families with more than two children were a common sight in villages or slum areas of large cities.

She warned that those families would have a much harder time competing as they may not receive proper basic needs.

"This burden should be shared not just by the government but also by the people. So there should be greater cooperation to once again to promote the family planning program," Megawati said.