Work harder on environment, Soeharto says

Work harder on environment, Soeharto says

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia still needs to work hard at preserving
and strengthening the environment despite encouraging results on
this front, President Soeharto said.

Addressing a national coordination meeting on managing the
environment yesterday, Soeharto said Indonesia has made
significant progress in the 17 years since the appointment of a
minister to deal specifically with environmental issues.

Soeharto said the public's perception and awareness of the
need to preserve the environment have expanded. The diversity and
complexity of the problems have also become clearer, he said.

There is greater awareness for better coordination and
Indonesia has established laws and regulations and set up various
institutions to deal with environmental problems.

"But our tasks are still immense and heavy," he said. "The
environmental degradation of several decades requires time and
hard work to mend."

The meeting is the first of its kind since the 1978
establishment of the Office of the State Minister on Environment,
now headed by Sarwono Kusumaatmadja.

As well as environmental management, the three-day meeting
will review the programs on sustainable development, a concept
developed for the current government's Second Long Term
Development Program which spans 25 years and began last April.

"I hope this meeting will agree on policies and strategies on
environmental management during the Second Long Term Development
Program and integrate sustainable development policies with an
environmental outlook," Soeharto said.

Soeharto said 17 years was hardly adequate to undo some of the
environmental damages created over the previous decades.

Many of the present environmental problems have their roots in
the previous generations, and similarly, he reminded the
participants, many of the activities carried out today will have
their impact on the environment in the future.

Soeharto said Indonesia already has the legal basis for
environmental management with the Environmental Law in 1982.

What the nation needs now is steps to enforce the law, and for
this Soeharto proposed 10 steps.

They include conserving the environment, enhancing
environmental supporting capacity, improving the quality of the
environment, enhancing protection of fauna and flora being
exploited for commercial use, improving coordination between
human resources, natural resources and man-made resources.

The other measures are optimizing use of space, reducing the
risk of environmental destruction and pollution, encouraging
public participation, strengthening environmental information and
economics, and using or developing science and technology for the
management and protection of the environment.

Funds

The ministers addressing the conference were State Minister of
Environment Sarwono Kusumaatmadja, State Minister for National
Development Planning/Chairman of the National Development
Planning Board Ginanjar Kartasasmita, Minister of Home Affairs
Yogie S. Memet, Minister of Defense and Security Gen. Edi
Sudradjat, Coordinating Minister for Industry and Trade Hartarto
and Coordinating Minister for Political Affairs and Security
Soesilo Soedarman.

According to Ginanjar, environmental problems emerged as
people were not really ready to face the rapid economic growth,
which resulted in the exploitation of natural resources.

As far as the funds were concerned, it was not difficult to
deal with the case, he said. For the environment management, the
government allocated Rp 357 billion (US$172 million) for the
1994/1995 fiscal year, or Rp 2.6 trillion for the sixth Five-year
Development Plan (Repelita VI), which started this year.

"What is important is how to coordinate the allocation and use
of the funds," he said.

To prevent any misappropriation of the funds, the government
required clear targets of proposed projects under the so-called
Sarlita concept, Ginanjar said.

Sarwono told reporters that out of the Rp 357 billion, only Rp
8 billion was managed by his office and the Environmental Impact
Management Agency.

"The rest of the funds are uncontrolled... This is what we
can't tolerate," he said.

He underlined Ginanjar's statement on the importance of
coordination on the use of the funds, saying he did not require
more money for his office.

Sarwono said that one of the main obstacles in environmental
management is the lack of coordination among involved government
institutions -- both in the central and regional levels, the
private business sector and the public.(emb/sim)