Sarwono ready to work with responsible NGOs

Sarwono ready to work with responsible NGOs

By Prapti Widinugraheni

BANDA, Maluku: State Minister of Environment Sarwono
Kusumaatmadja challenges non-governmental organizations to speak
out on what they believe is true, but with accurate data.

NGOs should improve proficiency in their fields or stop their
activist activities, he said when opening a workshop on marine
conservation here Tuesday.

"If you (NGO activists) are afraid to take the challenge, be
a businessman instead and you can frighten people," Sarwono said
in the workshop sponsored by UNESCO in cooperation with the
Warisan Budaya Banda Foundation, Laut Lestari Indonesia and
Nature Conservancy International.

He did not, however, suggest that NGOs took a confrontational
approach when defending the people but he recommended that they
enhance cooperation with the government.

Local environmental NGOs have often been at odds with the
government because of their critical views of some state
policies.

In the latest case, several NGOs in various fields have filed
law suits against President Soeharto for issuing a decree that
allowed for the diversion of Rp 400 billion (US$187 million) in
reforestation funds to the state-own aviation industry, IPTN.

Sarwono acknowledged that NGOs were needed to help the
government handle areas which it could not manage or reach.

"It's not true that if the government is clean, everything in
the system will run effectively as many people imagine. The
problem is that the government cannot cope with all the 180
million population without help from the people," he said.

NGOs, he added, were needed as the government's partners to
share the burden in development.

In support of Sarwono's opinion on the need for community
participation in conservation was an argument from Graham F.
Usher of the Natural Resources Management Project which is
overseen by the United States Agency for International
Development (USAID).

Livelihood

Usher said that the danger in the centralized decision-making
process, as commonly practiced in Indonesia, was that the results
were not always appropriate for the local community. The local
people do not feel responsible for the results because they are
not involved, he added.

Usher in particular stressed the importance of community
participation in the conservation of coral reefs, a source of
livelihood for many local residents.

"Scientists and policy makers must consider those people who
live off the reefs and protect them as well," he said in fluent
Bahasa Indonesia.

The workshop opened on Monday by minister Sarwono was attended
by about 30 scientists from more than 10 countries.

The participants assessed the general situation of coral reefs
in eastern Indonesia, home to the greatest variety of species in
the world. They also examined the healing capacity of the coral
reefs.

Indonesia, two thirds of which is made up of seas, is rich in
coral reefs which are vital to physical and biological processes
in the sea and on land, especially along the coastlines.

Scientists have warned that the reefs have been rapidly
dwindling over the past few years, largely due to pollution and
over-exploitation.

Usher said that Indonesian students and scientists were in
urgent need of reference books on reefs to help conserve natural
resources.

"Indonesia and its high coral diversity should actually be the
world's center for coral reef studies," he said.