 Firstpost | Three Killed in Indonesia Shootout Wall Street Journal JAKARTA, Indonesia – Two suspected militants and a member of an elite Indonesian anti-terrorism squad died in a shootout as police attempted to capture a group responsible for the death of a policeman a day earlier, authorities said Saturday. Another ... 3 killed in anti-terrorism raid in IndonesiaFox News Indonesia anti-terror squad kills two suspected militantsChicago Tribune all 141 news articles » |
Sep 1, 2012
Three Killed in Indonesia Shootout - Wall Street Journal
Three Killed in Indonesia Shootout - Wall Street Journal:
Indonesia rescues 43 Sri Lankans adrift for 9 days - New York Daily News
Indonesia rescues 43 Sri Lankans adrift for 9 days - New York Daily News:
 Telegraph.co.uk | Indonesia rescues 43 Sri Lankans adrift for 9 days New York Daily News Indonesia rescues 43 Sri Lankans adrift for 9 days. Indonesia rescued 43 Sri Lankan asylum-seekers who had been adrift for nine days. Their boat had engine trouble while heading to Australia. Friday, August 31st 2012, 05:19 PM ... Indonesia rescues 43 Sri Lankans adrift 9 days after engine trouble while ...Washington Post Survivors of asylum boat reach safety in IndonesiaNBCNews.com (blog) Asylum boat survivors plead to be taken to AustraliaABC Online all 1,445 news articles » |
Inside Indonesia - Unsafe motherhood
Unsafe motherhood:
In late November last year, according to online news service Okezone, a poor woman named Yusleni arrived at Banda Aceh Women and Children’s Hospital to give birth to her second child. She was admitted to the emergency room and given an infusion. While in the emergency room, her husband completed the necessary paperwork to register her and arrange for the birth to be covered by Jamkesmas, a national health insurance scheme for poor people that pays hospitals a much lower rate than they are able to charge other patients. About an hour later, a hospital medical officer advised them that there were no beds available and that they would have to look for another maternity hospital. With Yusleni in advanced labour, she and her sister hailed a becak and, in the middle of the night, started looking for a local midwife to deliver the baby. Barely 300 metres down the road they were forced to turn back after her sister noticed that the baby’s head was already visible. This time the hospital found her a bed in the emergency room, and took care of the remainder of the delivery. Yusleni survived the ordeal, as did her baby, although the child required continued hospital treatment because of low birth weight.
Yusleni’s story is indicative of the difficulties that many Indonesian women, particularly from poor backgrounds, face in obtaining good quality affordable maternal healthcare through the Indonesian health system. More than a decade after a severe economic crisis that precipitated widespread civil and political unrest and the collapse of the New Order regime, Indonesia is again widely seen as a development success story – indeed, it is sometimes referred to as one of Asia’s ‘rising powers’. But in the area of maternal health, the successes have been modest and much remains to be done.
But it is well off track when it comes to goals related to maternal health. The country’s maternal mortality ratio – that is, the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births – is 228, well below the 1991 baseline figure of 390 but well above the MDG target of 102. If current trends continue, the country will miss this target by a considerable margin. Indonesia is also failing to meet its targets on the use of modern methods of contraception and reducing the ‘unmet need’ for family planning – that is, the proportion of couples who want to limit the number of children they have but do not have access to contraception.
Another problem is poor administration and underfunding of government schemes aimed at funding maternal health care to the poor. Many poor people who are eligible for Jamkesmas cards do not receive them because of corruption and mistargeting. In some cases, local officials simply sell them to the highest bidder or give them away as a bribe to voters at election time. At the same time, underfunding of the Jamkesmas scheme means that, as Yusleni discovered, health providers in Indonesia have little incentive to provide health care to Jamkesmas patients because they can make more money by serving non-poor clients who pay a higher rate out of their own pocket. Poor clients consequently find it difficult to get admitted to hospitals and often get shabby treatment when they are admitted.
Recognising the limitations of Jamkesmas, the government has responded by introducing a new maternal health insurance scheme aimed explicitly at reducing maternal mortality. Known as Jampersal, this scheme is available on a universal basis – that is, to all women regardless of income or social background – rather than being targeted at the poor. As such, poor people do not need to present a Jamkesmas card when seeking to use the scheme, which is open to any woman with an identity card (KTP). While many poor people in Indonesia do not have KTPs, they are probably easier to obtain than Jamkesmas cards and the fact that they are useful for other things provides added incentive for poor people to get them. The Jampersal scheme appears to suffer from the same problems of underfunding as Jamkesmas, although the government has announced a significant increase in spending on the program for 2012.
At the same time, poor women are not well-organised in relation to health issues. What activism there is around these issues comes from a small group of NGOs that are poorly funded, limited in the geographic scope of their operations and, in some cases, motivated by perceived business opportunities rather than a concern for the poor.
This is not to dismiss the potential of schemes such as Jamkesmas and Jampersal to make a difference. Health economists emphasise the need for additional public money to be pumped into the health system when free health care schemes are introduced. Jamkesmas and Jampersal clearly contribute in this respect, even if they do not provide all the required funding. However, the fact that there are crucial political obstacles to reducing maternal mortality suggests that more is required than just additional money. Reducing maternal mortality also requires the empowerment of poor women in relation to the state officials who control the public health system. Only when poor women are able to influence policy-making decisions at both the governmental and health facility level and hold unscrupulous health professionals accountable will they be able to access the services required to ensure safe motherhood.
Empowering poor women requires measures that serve to help them organise around health issues, enhance the ability of NGOs to engage in lobbying and monitoring activities on their behalf, and the ability of these very different groups to come together. Donors interested in achieving the MDGs will need to attend to these issues, not just the technical aspects of maternal health care, if they are to have any hope of achieving the 2015 targets.
Andrew Rosser (andrew.rosser@adelaide.edu.au) is Associate Professor in Development Studies and Associate Director of the Indo-Pacific Governance Research Centre at the University of Adelaide.
For poor women in Indonesia, giving birth can be a life-threatening experience
Andrew Rosser
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The cover of Eko Prasetyo's book, Poor People Are Forbidden to be Sick, captures well the challenge that poor people in Indonesia face in gaining access to health care |
Yusleni’s story is indicative of the difficulties that many Indonesian women, particularly from poor backgrounds, face in obtaining good quality affordable maternal healthcare through the Indonesian health system. More than a decade after a severe economic crisis that precipitated widespread civil and political unrest and the collapse of the New Order regime, Indonesia is again widely seen as a development success story – indeed, it is sometimes referred to as one of Asia’s ‘rising powers’. But in the area of maternal health, the successes have been modest and much remains to be done.
Progress so far
In 2000, the international community under United Nations auspices established a set of development targets known as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), all of which are meant to be achieved by 2015. Indonesia is on track to meet many of these goals, particularly those related to the number of people living on less than US$1 per day, the proportion of children under 5 years of age who are underweight, universal primary school enrolment and completion, gender equity in education, literacy, child mortality, and the incidence of diseases such as tuberculosis and malaria.But it is well off track when it comes to goals related to maternal health. The country’s maternal mortality ratio – that is, the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births – is 228, well below the 1991 baseline figure of 390 but well above the MDG target of 102. If current trends continue, the country will miss this target by a considerable margin. Indonesia is also failing to meet its targets on the use of modern methods of contraception and reducing the ‘unmet need’ for family planning – that is, the proportion of couples who want to limit the number of children they have but do not have access to contraception.
Weaknesses in the system
There are a number of reasons why Indonesia has done so poorly in these respects. One is that many women are less fortunate than Yusleni and give birth without any assistance from a health professional, even though such assistance is a key preventative measure against maternal (as well as child) mortality. According to current official figures, almost one-quarter of births in Indonesia occur without the assistance of a doctor, nurse or midwife. At the same time, there is enormous variation by region and class. While 98 per cent of births in Jakarta involve a health professional, only 42 per cent of those in Maluku do. Seventy per cent of Indonesia’s wealthiest women give birth with the assistance of a health professional but only 10 per cent of its poorest women do.Another problem is poor administration and underfunding of government schemes aimed at funding maternal health care to the poor. Many poor people who are eligible for Jamkesmas cards do not receive them because of corruption and mistargeting. In some cases, local officials simply sell them to the highest bidder or give them away as a bribe to voters at election time. At the same time, underfunding of the Jamkesmas scheme means that, as Yusleni discovered, health providers in Indonesia have little incentive to provide health care to Jamkesmas patients because they can make more money by serving non-poor clients who pay a higher rate out of their own pocket. Poor clients consequently find it difficult to get admitted to hospitals and often get shabby treatment when they are admitted.
Recognising the limitations of Jamkesmas, the government has responded by introducing a new maternal health insurance scheme aimed explicitly at reducing maternal mortality. Known as Jampersal, this scheme is available on a universal basis – that is, to all women regardless of income or social background – rather than being targeted at the poor. As such, poor people do not need to present a Jamkesmas card when seeking to use the scheme, which is open to any woman with an identity card (KTP). While many poor people in Indonesia do not have KTPs, they are probably easier to obtain than Jamkesmas cards and the fact that they are useful for other things provides added incentive for poor people to get them. The Jampersal scheme appears to suffer from the same problems of underfunding as Jamkesmas, although the government has announced a significant increase in spending on the program for 2012.
Political obstacles and solutions
But perhaps the most worrying issue with Jampersal is that it does not address the underlying political obstacles to improving maternal health outcomes in Indonesia. The public health system in Indonesia is dominated by officials who have an interest in starving the health system of funds in order to finance more lucrative ‘projects’ in both health and other sectors, and in using health facilities to generate rent-seeking opportunities. At the health facility level, the focus is consequently on securing kickbacks from supply, building and employment contracts and maximising revenues from clients – giving them a strong incentive to serve middle class clients who can pay the full cost out of pocket rather than poor clients who cannot.At the same time, poor women are not well-organised in relation to health issues. What activism there is around these issues comes from a small group of NGOs that are poorly funded, limited in the geographic scope of their operations and, in some cases, motivated by perceived business opportunities rather than a concern for the poor.
This is not to dismiss the potential of schemes such as Jamkesmas and Jampersal to make a difference. Health economists emphasise the need for additional public money to be pumped into the health system when free health care schemes are introduced. Jamkesmas and Jampersal clearly contribute in this respect, even if they do not provide all the required funding. However, the fact that there are crucial political obstacles to reducing maternal mortality suggests that more is required than just additional money. Reducing maternal mortality also requires the empowerment of poor women in relation to the state officials who control the public health system. Only when poor women are able to influence policy-making decisions at both the governmental and health facility level and hold unscrupulous health professionals accountable will they be able to access the services required to ensure safe motherhood.
Empowering poor women requires measures that serve to help them organise around health issues, enhance the ability of NGOs to engage in lobbying and monitoring activities on their behalf, and the ability of these very different groups to come together. Donors interested in achieving the MDGs will need to attend to these issues, not just the technical aspects of maternal health care, if they are to have any hope of achieving the 2015 targets.
Andrew Rosser (andrew.rosser@adelaide.edu.au) is Associate Professor in Development Studies and Associate Director of the Indo-Pacific Governance Research Centre at the University of Adelaide.
Inside Indonesia 109: Jul-Sep 2012
Inside Indonesia - Because women deserve better
Because women deserve better:
About 9 million Indonesian households were headed by women in 2010. These households typically consist of up to six dependents and are poor, with many living below the poverty line. Female heads are between 20 to 60 years of age, and almost 40 per cent have never gone to school. These women are typically widows or have been abandoned by their husbands. With growing numbers of Indonesian men going abroad to work, some provinces have seen sharp increases in women headed households as migrant worker husbands start new families elsewhere and never return.
These Indonesian women, who are the sole providers for their families, face a range of discriminatory practices. To start with, female-headed households are not legally recognised under the 1974 Marriage Law, which states that men are heads of family. This makes it difficult for female heads to access government provisions for the poor, such as cash transfer schemes (Bantuan Langsung Tunai) or community health insurance (Jamkesmas). At the same time, expensive court fees stop women from accessing their own marriage or birth certificates, thereby preventing them from obtaining legal divorces or seeking any kind of compensation. The absence of mechanisms to assist female-headed households traps these marginalised women and their children in a vicious cycle of poverty.
Recognising these problems, Kopernik and Pekka, two not for profit organisations, formed a partnership in 2011 in an attempt to help more women heads of households escape poverty. The partnership focuses its efforts on women living in rural areas, where it assists female heads of households to adopt green technology and provides them with the opportunity to sell these technologies and earn commissions without taking on risk or debt. This additional income-earning activity enables the women who are involved to support their families with a more stable income and empowers them to become skilled businesswomen.
The Female Headed Household Empowerment Program (Pekka) is an Indonesian initiative that was developed in 2000 based on a recommendation by the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan). The program was established to document the lives of widows in conflict regions, especially Aceh. It has since evolved to a more comprehensive women’s empowerment program, effecting social change to strengthen the position of marginalised women. Pekka now works with poor women heads of households who have been abandoned by their husbands or who are widowed, divorced or unmarried; it also offers support to women who are married to a disabled husband. The program provides these women with vocational and technical training and a platform to set up micro loans and savings cooperatives.
Pekka members can purchase the products to use in their homes. A payment plan option is available if they cannot afford to pay in full. They also have the opportunity to become ‘technology agents’ and sell the products locally to earn a commission. They can later repay Kopernik for the cost of the products, replenish their inventory, and pocket extra earnings. They do this without having to take on risk or debt, as they can receive technologies on consignment without accruing any interest for an indefinite amount of time. There have not yet been any instances in either province of women being unable to sell the products they have taken on.
Kopernik also provides training on product knowledge, sales techniques and basic accounting for technology agents. This is to ensure the proper usage of the technologies is communicated to all end-users and equips the technology agents with business skills to help them succeed in their entrepreneurial endeavours. As agreed by members, and much to everyone’s delight, part of the commission also goes toward funding the Pekka women’s cooperatives. All funds that are returned to Kopernik are then used to purchase additional technology, thereby benefiting more people. This way, a single contribution from Kopernik’s website can effectively be recycled into many donations.
The anecdotes presented in the survey indicate that many women have been able to apply their new skills elsewhere and have gained greater self-confidence. One agent, who has seen an increase in her average monthly income of Rp.135,000 since she started as a technology agent, told the students that her husband left her in Lombok when he migrated to Malaysia ten years ago. He soon stopped sending remittances and stopped all communication. She said, ‘I heard that he made his own family there in Malaysia. I do not know if I am still married to him or divorced from him already, or even widowed… But in any case, I have to sustain my life all alone.’ She told the students that becoming a technology agent has not only enabled her to earn additional income, but that she feels ‘less lonely now as people in this village recognise me and talk to me’.
Both Kopernik and Pekka treat this partnership as a long-term cooperation that will produce ripple effect for women heads of households nationwide. The two organisations are already planning to replicate this program in two other Indonesian regions (Central Java and South Sulawesi) with the aim of giving even more women heads of households the opportunity and sense of empowerment that they deserve.
Cindy Nawilis (cindy.nawilis@kopernik.info) was born in Jakarta but spent the majority of her life in America. She studied International Relations at New York University and is now based in Bali where she is Project Officer at Kopernik.
The Kopernik website can be accessed at http://www.kopernik.info. More information about Pekka is available at http://www.pekka.co.id.
Two non-profit organisations work together to help women headed households break out of the poverty cycle
Cindy Nawilis
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A Pekka member in Lombok tests out a solar-powered light bulb for the first timeWillow Paule |
These Indonesian women, who are the sole providers for their families, face a range of discriminatory practices. To start with, female-headed households are not legally recognised under the 1974 Marriage Law, which states that men are heads of family. This makes it difficult for female heads to access government provisions for the poor, such as cash transfer schemes (Bantuan Langsung Tunai) or community health insurance (Jamkesmas). At the same time, expensive court fees stop women from accessing their own marriage or birth certificates, thereby preventing them from obtaining legal divorces or seeking any kind of compensation. The absence of mechanisms to assist female-headed households traps these marginalised women and their children in a vicious cycle of poverty.
Recognising these problems, Kopernik and Pekka, two not for profit organisations, formed a partnership in 2011 in an attempt to help more women heads of households escape poverty. The partnership focuses its efforts on women living in rural areas, where it assists female heads of households to adopt green technology and provides them with the opportunity to sell these technologies and earn commissions without taking on risk or debt. This additional income-earning activity enables the women who are involved to support their families with a more stable income and empowers them to become skilled businesswomen.
Kopernik and Pekka
Kopernik is an online marketplace of innovative technologies, including solar lights, water filters and fuel efficient cookstoves. The website connects companies that manufacture new environmental technologies with local organisations that can bring life-improving products to people living in poverty. All projects are funded by individual and corporate donors who ‘crowd- fund’ projects of their choice directly via Kopernik’s website. Crowd funding describes the collective cooperation of people who network and pool their money together, typically via the internet, to support efforts initiated by other people or organisations. From the donations made by individuals and corporations through the crowd funding process on Kopernik’s website, Kopernik has implemented 43 projects in 11 countries, selling products to 75,000 people since starting in February 2010.The Female Headed Household Empowerment Program (Pekka) is an Indonesian initiative that was developed in 2000 based on a recommendation by the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan). The program was established to document the lives of widows in conflict regions, especially Aceh. It has since evolved to a more comprehensive women’s empowerment program, effecting social change to strengthen the position of marginalised women. Pekka now works with poor women heads of households who have been abandoned by their husbands or who are widowed, divorced or unmarried; it also offers support to women who are married to a disabled husband. The program provides these women with vocational and technical training and a platform to set up micro loans and savings cooperatives.
Agents of technology, agents of change
Kopernik begins its involvement in each province by holding a technology fair to showcase its products, which range from solar powered LED lights to fuel-efficient biomass cookstoves to ceramic water filters to bicycle powered corn shellers. Most are locally manufactured in Indonesia – Kopernik aims to provide technologies that are locally made in the country where each project is located – and therefore can be made available at a relatively affordable cost. Since 2011, Kopernik has organised six technology fairs throughout West Nusa Tenggara and East Nusa Tenggara, two of Indonesia’s poorest provinces. Each time, hundreds of Pekka members were invited to attend, and many curious community members also turned up. After each technology fair, Pekka members deliberate on which products would most benefit households in the area. They then present to Kopernik the number of requests for each technology. The program officially starts when Kopernik places its first round of products based on these requests.Pekka members can purchase the products to use in their homes. A payment plan option is available if they cannot afford to pay in full. They also have the opportunity to become ‘technology agents’ and sell the products locally to earn a commission. They can later repay Kopernik for the cost of the products, replenish their inventory, and pocket extra earnings. They do this without having to take on risk or debt, as they can receive technologies on consignment without accruing any interest for an indefinite amount of time. There have not yet been any instances in either province of women being unable to sell the products they have taken on.
 |
A Pekka member enjoying her Nazava water purifier in her home in KelubagolitLaura Surroca |
What’s in it for the women?
In a survey conducted by Columbia University students this year, most women who participate in the program said that they have acquired new skills since becoming technology agents, including sales and communication skills. Forty per cent of the women have seen their income rise, even though the program had only been operating for six months at the time of the survey. Those who had earned a commission from their sales used it toward household needs or children’s school fees and supplies. The survey also showed that the opportunity cost of becoming a technology agent is minor – most the women make their sales during their free time so the program does not interfere with other activities.The anecdotes presented in the survey indicate that many women have been able to apply their new skills elsewhere and have gained greater self-confidence. One agent, who has seen an increase in her average monthly income of Rp.135,000 since she started as a technology agent, told the students that her husband left her in Lombok when he migrated to Malaysia ten years ago. He soon stopped sending remittances and stopped all communication. She said, ‘I heard that he made his own family there in Malaysia. I do not know if I am still married to him or divorced from him already, or even widowed… But in any case, I have to sustain my life all alone.’ She told the students that becoming a technology agent has not only enabled her to earn additional income, but that she feels ‘less lonely now as people in this village recognise me and talk to me’.
To date and ahead
Since the first distribution of products in September 2011, the members of Pekka’s West Nusa Tenggara branch have received over 600 biomass cookstoves and water purifiers on consignment, while those of the East Nusa Tenggara branch have received over 1200 items, including cookstoves, water purifiers and solar lights. Sales by members have been steady, except during the harvest season when most women spend their days in the fields and the market selling crops.Both Kopernik and Pekka treat this partnership as a long-term cooperation that will produce ripple effect for women heads of households nationwide. The two organisations are already planning to replicate this program in two other Indonesian regions (Central Java and South Sulawesi) with the aim of giving even more women heads of households the opportunity and sense of empowerment that they deserve.
Cindy Nawilis (cindy.nawilis@kopernik.info) was born in Jakarta but spent the majority of her life in America. She studied International Relations at New York University and is now based in Bali where she is Project Officer at Kopernik.
The Kopernik website can be accessed at http://www.kopernik.info. More information about Pekka is available at http://www.pekka.co.id.
Inside Indonesia 109: Jul-Sep 2012
Inside Indonesia - Loans for change
Loans for change:
Ibu Yuliana and her family live in the rural village of Lempo in Tana Toraja. Her days remain busy even though her four adult children now live away from home. She and her husband are subsistence farmers, and grow their own rice, coffee and vegetables. They produce enough to put food on the table but seldom enough to make a profit, so they rely on their eldest son to send them money to supplement their income. Like most of Indonesia’s low income population, this means that it is almost impossible for them to save money to cover large expenditures such as education for all their children.
But things looked up for Ibu Yuliana last year when she was among a group of women who received a National Program for Community Empowerment (PNPM) loan from the local government. Most micro credit programs focus on income-generating activities, but PNPM loans are very flexible. Ibu Yuliana used her share to finance home improvements and pay her three daughters’ fees at a local university. She then pays back the loan from the money she receives from her son every two months.
The micro credit scheme began in Tana Toraja four years ago, and the number of participants has doubled each year. Women’s groups have typically applied for the loans to provide capital to start a small foodstall, to buy a pig or seeds for their garden, or to pay for their children’s education. According to Pak Medin, the local government PNPM facilitator, the repayment rate in the region is very high because the women feel a collective responsibility, which encourages the group members to fulfil their obligation to repay the loan.
The loans, which range between Rp.300,000 and 1,000,000 (A$33- A$112), must be repaid within six months at a 12 per cent interest rate. If the loan is not repaid within this period, the group is banned from applying again to the scheme in the near future. As the majority of the loans are for non-income raising ventures, such as school fees, or home improvements – as in the case of Ibu Yuliana – they are often paid back with the remittances received from family members working elsewhere.
In other parts of Sulawesi women supplement their household income by participating in NGO-sponsored savings schemes. One such a scheme is organised by local women’s groups in five major provinces in South Sulawesi that are part of Jaringan Perempuan Usaha Kecil (JarPUK). When these groups were first established in 1987, they operated as forums to raise awareness about gender sensitive issues. In 2000 they began to implement district level saving schemes, funded by the NGO Lembaga Mitra Lingkungan (LML). Today the savings schemes constitute the JarPUK groups’ most successful program.
The JarPUK savings scheme has two elements. The first is a classic ‘arisan’, a savings scheme based on a lottery system, with each woman contributing a small amount of money every month to a pot. The collected amount is then ‘won’ by a different woman based on a monthly roster. Like the PNPM program, the only requirements for membership are that women are willing to attend regular meetings and that they are local residents. Unlike the loan scheme, however, women do not need to apply and, because they use their own money, there are no formal repayments.
JarPUK also organises a collective savings scheme, with each woman in a group contributing a small amount which is then deposited into the community bank. Funds can later be loaned to members to be used as start-up capital for a small business. The most successful enterprises funded by the scheme have been some of the smallest. One woman bought make-up in bulk with her start-up capital, and then sells this to other women who find it difficult to the leave the village, making a small profit in the process. Another group borrowed money from the collective to set up a small business making cakes and snacks which are sold at a kiosk in the village.
As part of these schemes JarPUK also offer information and training sessions, with topics including household budget management, health and sanitation, organic fertilisers, and sales techniques ‘from farm to market’. The organisation argues that their training increases women’s decision making and leadership skills. According to one participant I spoke to, the savings schemes are empowering as they enable women to have some degree of control over their family finances. She noted that women’s capacity to contribute to the household income through their participation in the arisan or by starting a small business makes husbands realise over time that their wives can manage the household’s income.
The loan schemes are also having a positive effect on future generations of Indonesian women. Ibu Yuliana’s three daughters have access to a higher level of education than they could have had if she hadn’t had access to a PNPM loan. The daughters of women who establish businesses using capital from the JarPUK collective savings scheme have strong mothers as role models, who can inspire them to take charge of their lives. It is with these small steps that microfinance schemes are helping poor households achieve changes that will make a big difference in the longer term.
Joanne Morton (jmor4517@uni.sydney.edu.au) is an undergraduate student majoring in Anthropology at the University of Sydney.
A little help can go a long way when it comes to helping poor women to get ahead
Joanne Morton
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Ibu Yuliana collects cassava for breakfast every morningJoanne Morton |
But things looked up for Ibu Yuliana last year when she was among a group of women who received a National Program for Community Empowerment (PNPM) loan from the local government. Most micro credit programs focus on income-generating activities, but PNPM loans are very flexible. Ibu Yuliana used her share to finance home improvements and pay her three daughters’ fees at a local university. She then pays back the loan from the money she receives from her son every two months.
The PNPM program
PNPM is a national government program that was initiated in 2007 with the aim of alleviating poverty through community driven micro credit initiatives. Now PNPM loans are available in poor communities where no other form of financial assistance is accessible. Groups of women of ten or less can apply for a loan based on a ‘shared purpose’. In order to be eligible, applicants must be willing to participate in monthly meetings and be a local resident. The PNPM program is pro-poor, and applicants are assessed on their ability to make repayments rather than their level of assets.The micro credit scheme began in Tana Toraja four years ago, and the number of participants has doubled each year. Women’s groups have typically applied for the loans to provide capital to start a small foodstall, to buy a pig or seeds for their garden, or to pay for their children’s education. According to Pak Medin, the local government PNPM facilitator, the repayment rate in the region is very high because the women feel a collective responsibility, which encourages the group members to fulfil their obligation to repay the loan.
The loans, which range between Rp.300,000 and 1,000,000 (A$33- A$112), must be repaid within six months at a 12 per cent interest rate. If the loan is not repaid within this period, the group is banned from applying again to the scheme in the near future. As the majority of the loans are for non-income raising ventures, such as school fees, or home improvements – as in the case of Ibu Yuliana – they are often paid back with the remittances received from family members working elsewhere.
Savings schemes
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A government campaign promotes the PNPM programJoanne Morton |
The JarPUK savings scheme has two elements. The first is a classic ‘arisan’, a savings scheme based on a lottery system, with each woman contributing a small amount of money every month to a pot. The collected amount is then ‘won’ by a different woman based on a monthly roster. Like the PNPM program, the only requirements for membership are that women are willing to attend regular meetings and that they are local residents. Unlike the loan scheme, however, women do not need to apply and, because they use their own money, there are no formal repayments.
JarPUK also organises a collective savings scheme, with each woman in a group contributing a small amount which is then deposited into the community bank. Funds can later be loaned to members to be used as start-up capital for a small business. The most successful enterprises funded by the scheme have been some of the smallest. One woman bought make-up in bulk with her start-up capital, and then sells this to other women who find it difficult to the leave the village, making a small profit in the process. Another group borrowed money from the collective to set up a small business making cakes and snacks which are sold at a kiosk in the village.
As part of these schemes JarPUK also offer information and training sessions, with topics including household budget management, health and sanitation, organic fertilisers, and sales techniques ‘from farm to market’. The organisation argues that their training increases women’s decision making and leadership skills. According to one participant I spoke to, the savings schemes are empowering as they enable women to have some degree of control over their family finances. She noted that women’s capacity to contribute to the household income through their participation in the arisan or by starting a small business makes husbands realise over time that their wives can manage the household’s income.
Loans for the future
Whether microfinance schemes are provided by the government or NGOs, they lead to the same outcomes. The schemes help low income households like Ibu Yuliana’s stretch their limited resources to improve their situation. And the benefits of the schemes are not confined to economic gains. They also empower women to manage household finances and give them a voice.The loan schemes are also having a positive effect on future generations of Indonesian women. Ibu Yuliana’s three daughters have access to a higher level of education than they could have had if she hadn’t had access to a PNPM loan. The daughters of women who establish businesses using capital from the JarPUK collective savings scheme have strong mothers as role models, who can inspire them to take charge of their lives. It is with these small steps that microfinance schemes are helping poor households achieve changes that will make a big difference in the longer term.
Joanne Morton (jmor4517@uni.sydney.edu.au) is an undergraduate student majoring in Anthropology at the University of Sydney.
Inside Indonesia 109: Jul-Sep 2012
Inside Indonesia - Reality or just rhetoric?
Reality or just rhetoric?:
The term ‘gender’ has become part of the every day vocabulary of Indonesian policy-makers. But most of them don’t really know what it means. When they talk about gender mainstreaming in development, they usually mean some kind of women’s empowerment initiative. As a result, gender mainstreaming tends to be thought of in terms of programs for women. This approach results in the establishment of separate programs or a dedicated component for women in a broader project. This ‘add women and stir’ method is a long-established one in the international development community, but one whose time is long gone.
The gender mainstreaming approach recognises that both women and men benefit from the systematic inclusion of a gender perspective in planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of development policies and programs. In theory, it is very different from women’s empowerment programs in terms of its scope, the actors involved, and its impact. In terms of its scope, the women’s empowerment programs of the past were very much at the periphery, while gender mainstreaming is positioned at the centre. In terms of actors, all bureaucrats at all levels and in all sectors have a responsibility to implement gender mainstreaming, whereas responsibility for women’s empowerment programs was assigned to particular levels of the bureaucracy in particular sectors.
In terms of impact, gender mainstreaming has the potential to create far deeper forms of change, precisely because it sits at the centre and not the periphery. But because gender mainstreaming is a strategy rather than a program, it cannot be separated from the practice of development. And so as long as bureaucrats continue to think that ‘gender’ means ‘women’, gender mainstreaming will remain little more than rhetoric.
A decade before, the Indonesian government had already taken an important step towards eliminating gender discrimination, in the form of Law No.7/1984. It was this law that underpinned Presidential Instruction No.9/2000, which instructed all government departments and agencies at the national, provincial and local level to adopt the principles of gender mainstreaming in planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of development policies and programs. This instruction, along with Law No.25/2000, provided the legal basis for the implementation of gender mainstreaming in Indonesia’s development programs.
The implementation of gender mainstreaming was anything but smooth. Initially, the Minister of Internal Affairs established a regulation (Kepmendagri No. 132/2003) that decreed that a minimum of 5 per cent of national and regional budget expenditure must be allocated to the implementation of gender mainstreaming. This did not work as expected, as different parts of the government applied for separate budgets for their gender mainstreaming programs. The regulation was replaced with another (Kepmendagri No. 15/2008), which required that governors ensure that their Community Empowerment section coordinated the implementation of gender mainstreaming, for example, by establishing working groups to promote and facilitate gender mainstreaming in different sectors.
In between, however, the government issued a transitional government plan (RPJMD Transition 2006-2008) which attached empowerment programs for women and children to a ‘quality of life’ development agenda, enough, it felt, to demonstrated that it had integrated gender into its development policies. This sidelining of gender mainstreaming has continued, with the current administration positioning gender mainstreaming as part of the agenda of ‘strengthening community institutions’ – in effect again equating them with women’s empowerment.
It is not surprising that the Ministry for Women’s Empowerment is responsible for the roll-out of gender mainstreaming at the national level. One of the key problems with the ongoing misunderstanding about the nature of gender is the assumption that gender mainstreaming should (like a women’s empowerment program) have a separate budget and be the responsibility of a particular department. So bureaucrats think they can tick the ‘gender mainstreaming’ box by getting their women’s empowerment department, section or bureau to organise some activities for women.
In practice, however, a lot of bureaucrats are taking short cuts. For example, a number of sectors claim to have integrated gender mainstreaming in their program, when in fact they have simply included women in their activities without any gender analysis. The annual development planning consultations (musrenbang), which are supposed to provide a forum for stakeholder input into developing planning, are a case in point. The process looks great on paper, but it’s really just a box-ticking exercise that has little impact on development planning. To make matters worse, the people who get invited to these consultations are public figures, religious figures, community leaders and sectoral representatives – groups that are all dominated by men. The women who do get to attend tend to be elite women associated with the family welfare organisation, PKK, who have no idea about the everyday concerns of the working class women they supposedly are there to represent.
Take agriculture, for example. The programs to be offered to farmers were supposedly ‘gender neutral’. But men and women do different kinds of farming work. Men usually are responsible for the preparation of fields and for planting, while women tend to process agricultural products. So when ‘gender neutral’ training is done on field preparation and planting, the participants it benefits are the men. These kinds of things get through the musrenbang process for two reasons. First, the elite women present have probably never even set foot in a field, let alone thought about the division of agricultural labour. In any case, even when they are given a chance to speak, what they say is pretty much ignored because there’s a general feeling still that it’s men who know best what women want and need.
The failure to consult the real stakeholders means that problems occur even when a gender analysis is employed. In another case, a program designed for mung bean farmers failed spectacularly because of its complete misreading of the needs of poor farmers. Instead of teaching women how to make bakpia, the primary ingredient of which is mung beans, they were to be taught how to make rempeyek, a fragrant cracker whose main ingredient is peanuts, which they were forced to buy. Meanwhile, the men were to be taught how to make their own fertiliser, which was totally impractical because of the costs of the fertiliser components.
The commitment is now there, but on its own it’s not enough. As the South Sulawesi experience confirms, a commitment on paper may or may not lead to action. Even where it does, there is no guarantee that those tasked with implementing it actually understand – or have any commitment to – achieving real change.
The road ahead isn’t easy, but what’s needed is clear. We need to move beyond policy statements to ensure that bureaucrats have a deep understanding of the principles of gender mainstreaming and the techniques needed to achieve it. Without this ‘why and how’, there is little chance that development practice in Indonesia will ever achieve gender equality.
Nurul Ilmi Idrus (nurulilmiidrus@yahoo.com) teaches Anthropology at Hasanuddin University in Makassar.
The Indonesian government has come a long way when it comes to legislating for gender mainstreaming, but not enough has changed in terms of development practice
Nurul Ilmi Idrus
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Mostly women attend a meeting at the Bureau for the Empowerment of Women and Family PlanningKoleksi Badan Pemberdayaan Perempuan dan Keluarga Berencana, Provinsi Sulawesi Selatan |
The gender mainstreaming approach recognises that both women and men benefit from the systematic inclusion of a gender perspective in planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of development policies and programs. In theory, it is very different from women’s empowerment programs in terms of its scope, the actors involved, and its impact. In terms of its scope, the women’s empowerment programs of the past were very much at the periphery, while gender mainstreaming is positioned at the centre. In terms of actors, all bureaucrats at all levels and in all sectors have a responsibility to implement gender mainstreaming, whereas responsibility for women’s empowerment programs was assigned to particular levels of the bureaucracy in particular sectors.
In terms of impact, gender mainstreaming has the potential to create far deeper forms of change, precisely because it sits at the centre and not the periphery. But because gender mainstreaming is a strategy rather than a program, it cannot be separated from the practice of development. And so as long as bureaucrats continue to think that ‘gender’ means ‘women’, gender mainstreaming will remain little more than rhetoric.
From global to local
The idea of gender mainstreaming came out of the fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing in 1995. Indonesia was one of the 189 countries that ratified the conference’s Platform of Action, which urged government and other development actors to actively pursue gender equality and adopt a gender perspective in all policies and programs.A decade before, the Indonesian government had already taken an important step towards eliminating gender discrimination, in the form of Law No.7/1984. It was this law that underpinned Presidential Instruction No.9/2000, which instructed all government departments and agencies at the national, provincial and local level to adopt the principles of gender mainstreaming in planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of development policies and programs. This instruction, along with Law No.25/2000, provided the legal basis for the implementation of gender mainstreaming in Indonesia’s development programs.
The implementation of gender mainstreaming was anything but smooth. Initially, the Minister of Internal Affairs established a regulation (Kepmendagri No. 132/2003) that decreed that a minimum of 5 per cent of national and regional budget expenditure must be allocated to the implementation of gender mainstreaming. This did not work as expected, as different parts of the government applied for separate budgets for their gender mainstreaming programs. The regulation was replaced with another (Kepmendagri No. 15/2008), which required that governors ensure that their Community Empowerment section coordinated the implementation of gender mainstreaming, for example, by establishing working groups to promote and facilitate gender mainstreaming in different sectors.
In between, however, the government issued a transitional government plan (RPJMD Transition 2006-2008) which attached empowerment programs for women and children to a ‘quality of life’ development agenda, enough, it felt, to demonstrated that it had integrated gender into its development policies. This sidelining of gender mainstreaming has continued, with the current administration positioning gender mainstreaming as part of the agenda of ‘strengthening community institutions’ – in effect again equating them with women’s empowerment.
It is not surprising that the Ministry for Women’s Empowerment is responsible for the roll-out of gender mainstreaming at the national level. One of the key problems with the ongoing misunderstanding about the nature of gender is the assumption that gender mainstreaming should (like a women’s empowerment program) have a separate budget and be the responsibility of a particular department. So bureaucrats think they can tick the ‘gender mainstreaming’ box by getting their women’s empowerment department, section or bureau to organise some activities for women.
The South Sulawesi experience
At the provincial level, the Bureau for Welfare, Religion and Women’s Empowerment’s women’s empowerment section (which has since 2008 been known as the Bureau for the Empowerment of Women and Family Planning), located in Makassar, is responsible for building local capacity to support the implementation of gender mainstreaming. One of its biggest achievements was the passing of Gubernatorial Regulation No.62/2011on Integrating Gender Mainstreaming into Development Policies and Programs, which led to a number of initiatives, including the establishment of gender mainstreaming working groups at the provincial and district levels with the aim of encouraging each government sector to establish at least two programs that incorporate gender mainstreaming by 2013. In addition, a number of gender mainstreaming projects have been funded by international donors such as United Nations Development Program and the Canadian International Development Agency.In practice, however, a lot of bureaucrats are taking short cuts. For example, a number of sectors claim to have integrated gender mainstreaming in their program, when in fact they have simply included women in their activities without any gender analysis. The annual development planning consultations (musrenbang), which are supposed to provide a forum for stakeholder input into developing planning, are a case in point. The process looks great on paper, but it’s really just a box-ticking exercise that has little impact on development planning. To make matters worse, the people who get invited to these consultations are public figures, religious figures, community leaders and sectoral representatives – groups that are all dominated by men. The women who do get to attend tend to be elite women associated with the family welfare organisation, PKK, who have no idea about the everyday concerns of the working class women they supposedly are there to represent.
Take agriculture, for example. The programs to be offered to farmers were supposedly ‘gender neutral’. But men and women do different kinds of farming work. Men usually are responsible for the preparation of fields and for planting, while women tend to process agricultural products. So when ‘gender neutral’ training is done on field preparation and planting, the participants it benefits are the men. These kinds of things get through the musrenbang process for two reasons. First, the elite women present have probably never even set foot in a field, let alone thought about the division of agricultural labour. In any case, even when they are given a chance to speak, what they say is pretty much ignored because there’s a general feeling still that it’s men who know best what women want and need.
The failure to consult the real stakeholders means that problems occur even when a gender analysis is employed. In another case, a program designed for mung bean farmers failed spectacularly because of its complete misreading of the needs of poor farmers. Instead of teaching women how to make bakpia, the primary ingredient of which is mung beans, they were to be taught how to make rempeyek, a fragrant cracker whose main ingredient is peanuts, which they were forced to buy. Meanwhile, the men were to be taught how to make their own fertiliser, which was totally impractical because of the costs of the fertiliser components.
A long way to go
The fact that there’s now a commitment to the gender mainstreaming agenda at the policy level is a move in the right direction. Previously, the absence of a strong commitment in the regions made it impossible to implement gender mainstreaming initiatives.The commitment is now there, but on its own it’s not enough. As the South Sulawesi experience confirms, a commitment on paper may or may not lead to action. Even where it does, there is no guarantee that those tasked with implementing it actually understand – or have any commitment to – achieving real change.
The road ahead isn’t easy, but what’s needed is clear. We need to move beyond policy statements to ensure that bureaucrats have a deep understanding of the principles of gender mainstreaming and the techniques needed to achieve it. Without this ‘why and how’, there is little chance that development practice in Indonesia will ever achieve gender equality.
Nurul Ilmi Idrus (nurulilmiidrus@yahoo.com) teaches Anthropology at Hasanuddin University in Makassar.
Inside Indonesia 109: Jul-Sep 2012
Inside Indonesia - Finding ecological justice for women
Finding ecological justice for women:
During International Women’s Day this year, women representing four of Indonesia’s leading environmental and agrarian NGOs called for women across the archipelago to unite and demand a more just and environmentally sustainable economic order. In a joint statement, representatives from WALHI (the Indonesian Forum for the Environment), the Indonesian Peasants Union (SPI), Indonesian Green Union (SHI) and People's Coalition for Fisheries Justice (KIARA) argued that as women bear the brunt of environmental problems, it is women who should take the lead in preventing or solving them.
While women’s NGOs have tended to focus on issues such as health, economic empowerment and domestic violence, this statement is indicative of a new effort to link women with environmental and social justice agendas. This new alliance is inspired by the radical values of ecofeminism, according to which the exploitation of women and the environment is inextricably linked to the capitalist economic system. But at the same time this is just one of an array of competing agendas currently being promoted in Indonesia which attempt to connect women with the environment in a variety of ways.
There is a general consensus that low income women’s vulnerability to these events stems from their role within the household, which involves a close dependence on natural resources. In most parts of rural Indonesia, women are responsible for carting water, collecting firewood and fodder for livestock and for other agricultural activities. The impact of natural disasters and environmental degradation make these activities difficult, if not impossible. Recently, during an exceptionally prolonged dry season, women in Lampung province had to walk long distances to collect water from a borehole owned by a wealthy family in the village, as their usual supplies had dried up.
Nor are low income women in urban areas spared the effects of natural disasters. In coastal cities such as Semarang, women who are employed as domestic workers are responsible for the burdensome additional task of clearing up when floods and tidal surges inundate the houses of their employers.
Recognising that women are particularly impacted by environmental degradation and disasters, some activists have argued that this means women need to be included as active participants in environmental management interventions. Proponents of this position argue that it is important to link gender mainstreaming efforts, women’s empowerment and initiatives to bring about more sustainable environmental management.
Recognising women’s prominent role in household water use, water and sanitation programs in particular are starting to make women’s participation a priority objective. But there also continue to be failures in this sector. A recent public works project in East Java constructed water supply tanks some distance from the village, with the result that women were unable to carry water to their homes and had to pay motorbike taxis (ojek) to help them. In this instance failure to consider women’s voices not only compromised the project goal of improving access to water, but also reinforced the women’s status as dependent on men.
Certainly including women’s voices in environmental management interventions is complex. Women often have no power to make key decisions about the resources they use. This partly explains a widely reported lack of engagement by low-income women in natural resource management initiatives in rural areas. Efforts to strengthen women’s empowerment in natural resource projects are further complicated by low-income women’s lack of time to attend meetings or to engage in collective work tasks. And conservative social values make it difficult for them to speak up in public forums, with the result that these women often prefer to leave it to educated, urban-based elite women to speak on their behalf.
In its scheme to grant land title to households in post-tsunami Aceh, the World Bank has sought to address this issue by raising community awareness about women’s land rights and training the National Land Agency (BPN) staff who are responsible for implementing the program. The World Bank claims that around 28 per cent of registrations through the Reconstruction of Aceh Land Administration System (RALAS) scheme have been issued to women, either individually or jointly with their husbands. Noting that securing women’s land rights is important for addressing women’s vulnerability and fundamental to rebuilding sustainable communities, the organisation showcased this project as an example of good practice in addressing gender concerns in disaster risk management.
Attempts to achieve environmental protection through individual, formalised land tenure reflect a neoliberal agenda of individualising responsibility for environmentally sustainable development. The success of this approach depends on ensuring that individuals behave in environmentally friendly ways. It is no coincidence that a large section of the World Bank’s 2009 report, entitled Investing in a More Sustainable Indonesia, is devoted to a discussion of public attitudes towards the environment. According to surveys cited in the report, currently few Indonesians are inspired into either political participation or personal action by environmental protection or conservation values. The report exhorts the importance of fostering greater public awareness about the connections between individual actions and environmental degradation. Women are seen as a lynchpin in environmental behaviour change largely through their domestic role: protecting water and biodiversity, minimising household waste, and as carers and educators of children.
But such initiatives fail to acknowledge that the most serious environmental problems women contend with stem from Indonesia’s commitment to exploitative economic development. Many of the country’s natural resource challenges reflect a contradiction between environmental protection and the drive for economic growth, which is directly linked to the exploitation of natural resources. Despite the political changes following the departure of Suharto in 1998, natural resources continue to be exploited by elites for political or personal gain. Indonesia’s corrupt environmental governance not only undermines efforts to achieve environmental sustainability but also results in catastrophic impacts for women – and men – in resource-dependent communities.
According to SPI, in 2011 almost 274,000 families were evicted from land they had been cultivating. NGOs point out that these recent dispossessions are associated with the local government’s power to issue concessions to plantation companies, in exchange for lucrative resource exploitation revenue. Many such evictions are legal according to Plantation Law No. 18/2004, which activists argue favours corporate interests and enables the intimidation, forced eviction and criminalisation of farmers.
While whole families are affected by these processes, women’s lack of voice within their communities has made them especially vulnerable to dispossession. Women’s livelihood activities are often the first to be affected by the development of large-scale plantations, which curtails their ability to collect fuel, fodder and foodstuffs from hitherto forested areas. Indeed, the steep rise in numbers of women migrating to become domestic workers overseas is partly attributable to their diminishing prospects in rural areas where large scale commercial agriculture is developing apace.
The marginalisation of women though land conflict is also particularly acute for migrant women in Indonesia’s rural areas. For example, in Lampung province, disputes over land between local communities and plantation companies are further complicated by the large migrant population, many of whom acquired land from local Lampung people, only to later find it had been granted as plantation concessions by the government. In heated conflicts in Lampung’s Mesuji district, migrant women have been particularly vulnerable because they lack access to family support networks and because the communities they have built in the area since the late 1990s have no formal recognition, effectively excluding them from drawing on state resources. They are now caught in the midst of clashes between local communities and plantations over access to land given over to plantation company PT Silva Inhutani. This is just one of many similar cases across Indonesia where people are being displaced from their land, and in which women’s growing vulnerability is of particular concern.
Granting land title to women to strengthen their position is an attractive prospect for donors such as the World Bank. It is an approach that fits with the Bank’s commitment to marketisation and its measurability aligns with the audit culture that accompanies some forms of gender mainstreaming. But it is unlikely to provide a route to ecological justice for women. Activists have even suggested that individual tenure contributes to the vulnerability of the poor by exposing them to acquisitive land markets, which are the first step on the slippery slope towards dispossession.
The challenge ahead is to ensure that donor-led efforts to champion gender equity in relation to the environment do not weaken the prospects for achieving ecological justice. At the same time, women’s concerns must be placed centre-stage in mobilising against environmental injustices. The statement issued by women from Indonesia’s leading environmental and agrarian NGOs shows that these issues are now at least starting to be addressed.
Rebecca Elmhirst (r.j.elmhirst@brighton.ac.uk) is Principal Lecturer in Human Geography at the University of Brighton. She has been researching gender and environmental issues in Indonesia for 20 years, working closely with colleagues from universities and NGOs in Lampung. She is co-editor of Gender and Natural Resource Management in Asia (Earthscan).
As Indonesia’s rural poor are increasingly threatened by dispossession, is it time to adopt a more radical agenda for women and the environment?
Rebecca Elmhirst
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Fisherwomen are hard-hit by environmental degradation in West Sumatra.Rebecca Elmhirst |
While women’s NGOs have tended to focus on issues such as health, economic empowerment and domestic violence, this statement is indicative of a new effort to link women with environmental and social justice agendas. This new alliance is inspired by the radical values of ecofeminism, according to which the exploitation of women and the environment is inextricably linked to the capitalist economic system. But at the same time this is just one of an array of competing agendas currently being promoted in Indonesia which attempt to connect women with the environment in a variety of ways.
Women and environmental crises
WALHI, SPI, SHI and KIARA’s joint statement echoes successive reports documenting how women have been disproportionately affected by recent natural disasters, including the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, the 2006 Java earthquake, the eruption of Merapi and the West Sumatra earthquake, both of which occurred in 2010. Beyond these large-scale and widely publicised disasters, low income women have also had to contend with the effects of climate change including more unpredictable weather events, especially drought and floods.There is a general consensus that low income women’s vulnerability to these events stems from their role within the household, which involves a close dependence on natural resources. In most parts of rural Indonesia, women are responsible for carting water, collecting firewood and fodder for livestock and for other agricultural activities. The impact of natural disasters and environmental degradation make these activities difficult, if not impossible. Recently, during an exceptionally prolonged dry season, women in Lampung province had to walk long distances to collect water from a borehole owned by a wealthy family in the village, as their usual supplies had dried up.
Nor are low income women in urban areas spared the effects of natural disasters. In coastal cities such as Semarang, women who are employed as domestic workers are responsible for the burdensome additional task of clearing up when floods and tidal surges inundate the houses of their employers.
Including women in environmental management
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Women's use of the environment is not the same as decision-making power.Rebecca Elmhirst |
Recognising women’s prominent role in household water use, water and sanitation programs in particular are starting to make women’s participation a priority objective. But there also continue to be failures in this sector. A recent public works project in East Java constructed water supply tanks some distance from the village, with the result that women were unable to carry water to their homes and had to pay motorbike taxis (ojek) to help them. In this instance failure to consider women’s voices not only compromised the project goal of improving access to water, but also reinforced the women’s status as dependent on men.
Certainly including women’s voices in environmental management interventions is complex. Women often have no power to make key decisions about the resources they use. This partly explains a widely reported lack of engagement by low-income women in natural resource management initiatives in rural areas. Efforts to strengthen women’s empowerment in natural resource projects are further complicated by low-income women’s lack of time to attend meetings or to engage in collective work tasks. And conservative social values make it difficult for them to speak up in public forums, with the result that these women often prefer to leave it to educated, urban-based elite women to speak on their behalf.
Individualising responsibility
One approach to expanding women’s control over environmental resources is to give them individual title to land, based on the premise that formalised access to land gives women greater bargaining power within the household and community. It also opens up women’s access to credit and other forms of state support, which is often conditional on demonstrating control over assets. Although Indonesian laws allow women equal opportunity to obtain land title, in practice land titling schemes that formalise existing arrangements have tended to grant titles in the name of the household head, who is usually male.In its scheme to grant land title to households in post-tsunami Aceh, the World Bank has sought to address this issue by raising community awareness about women’s land rights and training the National Land Agency (BPN) staff who are responsible for implementing the program. The World Bank claims that around 28 per cent of registrations through the Reconstruction of Aceh Land Administration System (RALAS) scheme have been issued to women, either individually or jointly with their husbands. Noting that securing women’s land rights is important for addressing women’s vulnerability and fundamental to rebuilding sustainable communities, the organisation showcased this project as an example of good practice in addressing gender concerns in disaster risk management.
Attempts to achieve environmental protection through individual, formalised land tenure reflect a neoliberal agenda of individualising responsibility for environmentally sustainable development. The success of this approach depends on ensuring that individuals behave in environmentally friendly ways. It is no coincidence that a large section of the World Bank’s 2009 report, entitled Investing in a More Sustainable Indonesia, is devoted to a discussion of public attitudes towards the environment. According to surveys cited in the report, currently few Indonesians are inspired into either political participation or personal action by environmental protection or conservation values. The report exhorts the importance of fostering greater public awareness about the connections between individual actions and environmental degradation. Women are seen as a lynchpin in environmental behaviour change largely through their domestic role: protecting water and biodiversity, minimising household waste, and as carers and educators of children.
Women and dispossession
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Migrant women in Lampung are caught up in land conflicts between local people and plantations.Rebecca Elmhirst |
According to SPI, in 2011 almost 274,000 families were evicted from land they had been cultivating. NGOs point out that these recent dispossessions are associated with the local government’s power to issue concessions to plantation companies, in exchange for lucrative resource exploitation revenue. Many such evictions are legal according to Plantation Law No. 18/2004, which activists argue favours corporate interests and enables the intimidation, forced eviction and criminalisation of farmers.
While whole families are affected by these processes, women’s lack of voice within their communities has made them especially vulnerable to dispossession. Women’s livelihood activities are often the first to be affected by the development of large-scale plantations, which curtails their ability to collect fuel, fodder and foodstuffs from hitherto forested areas. Indeed, the steep rise in numbers of women migrating to become domestic workers overseas is partly attributable to their diminishing prospects in rural areas where large scale commercial agriculture is developing apace.
The marginalisation of women though land conflict is also particularly acute for migrant women in Indonesia’s rural areas. For example, in Lampung province, disputes over land between local communities and plantation companies are further complicated by the large migrant population, many of whom acquired land from local Lampung people, only to later find it had been granted as plantation concessions by the government. In heated conflicts in Lampung’s Mesuji district, migrant women have been particularly vulnerable because they lack access to family support networks and because the communities they have built in the area since the late 1990s have no formal recognition, effectively excluding them from drawing on state resources. They are now caught in the midst of clashes between local communities and plantations over access to land given over to plantation company PT Silva Inhutani. This is just one of many similar cases across Indonesia where people are being displaced from their land, and in which women’s growing vulnerability is of particular concern.
The road ahead
While there is agreement that women are disproportionately affected by disaster and environmental degradation, there is little consensus as to how to address this concern. The process of strengthening women’s voice in environmental initiatives is complex when the pressures of poverty and conservative gender ideologies weigh against women’s active participation. And it is hard to see how extending women’s decision-making in environmental interventions could ever be meaningful when their access to productive resources may be steamrollered by corporate profit-seeking and government-supported environmental exploitation.Granting land title to women to strengthen their position is an attractive prospect for donors such as the World Bank. It is an approach that fits with the Bank’s commitment to marketisation and its measurability aligns with the audit culture that accompanies some forms of gender mainstreaming. But it is unlikely to provide a route to ecological justice for women. Activists have even suggested that individual tenure contributes to the vulnerability of the poor by exposing them to acquisitive land markets, which are the first step on the slippery slope towards dispossession.
The challenge ahead is to ensure that donor-led efforts to champion gender equity in relation to the environment do not weaken the prospects for achieving ecological justice. At the same time, women’s concerns must be placed centre-stage in mobilising against environmental injustices. The statement issued by women from Indonesia’s leading environmental and agrarian NGOs shows that these issues are now at least starting to be addressed.
Rebecca Elmhirst (r.j.elmhirst@brighton.ac.uk) is Principal Lecturer in Human Geography at the University of Brighton. She has been researching gender and environmental issues in Indonesia for 20 years, working closely with colleagues from universities and NGOs in Lampung. She is co-editor of Gender and Natural Resource Management in Asia (Earthscan).
Inside Indonesia 109: Jul-Sep 2012
Inside Indonesia - Women and development
Women and development:
Indonesian women have been the target of hundreds of gender-focused development programs but to what effect?
Over recent decades Indonesia’s 120 million women have been the target of a veritable barrage of gender-focused development initiatives designed to help reach the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goal of achieving ‘gender equity’ by 2015. Yet as this deadline looms, has the situation for women really improved? Are women any better equipped to gain access to work, healthcare, resources or government support?
This special edition of Inside Indonesia presents a variety of views on the extent to which gender-focused initiatives have improved or otherwise changed the day-to-day lives of Indonesian women. A number of the articles focus on the gap between those women who have benefited from development and those who are left behind. Some question the rationale underpinning particular development programs or the true effect of gender-focused government initiatives on women. Others focus on the marginalised women who benefit from development initiatives and consider the ways in which this is occurring.
Rosser sets the scene, writing about how government schemes which provide maternal healthcare to low-income women fail to provide an adequate level of support. He contends that these schemes cannot be fixed with more funding alone, but that they must also concentrate on empowering the mothers they aim to help. In the second article, Ford argues that although labour force participation is improving for women in Indonesia, the effect is not empowering for women across the board, leaving working-class women to shoulder much of the burden of development.
Shifting the focus to consider the effect of development programs more specifically, Elmhirst contends that many gender-focused environmental initiatives fail to address the fundamental unsustainability of exploitative economic development. She argues that while programs which focus on individualising environmental responsibility are problematic for this reason, there is hope in the form of emerging alliances between environmental NGOs and peasants unions, which are now starting to promote the values of ecofeminism.
Also shining a spotlight on development programs, Idrus is critical of ‘gender mainstreaming’ initiatives which set up special programs for women. She argues that all too often the Indonesian government conflates ‘gender equity’ and ‘women’s empowerment’, with the result that gender concerns are isolated from mainstream development practice. Continuing this close focus on the Indonesian government, Suryakusuma argues that the concept of ‘state ibuism’ – a term she coined over two decades ago – still holds relevance in contemporary Indonesia. She writes that although the role of the state has changed, women are still being constructed to fit into a patriarchal order, which now takes the form of a new state sanctioned version of Islam that is increasingly intruding in women’s lives.
The final two articles offer a more up-beat message. Morton’s article about women’s savings schemes in Sulawesi indicates that these kinds of initiatives can improve the situation for at least some women. She explains that by enabling low-income women to borrow very small amounts of money these schemes not only help improve quality of life but also empower participants. Similarly, Nawilis writes about how an alliance between two NGOs in Nusa Tenggara that is helping to empower female heads of households and promote sustainable technology at the same time. This is another example of the kind of small scale initiative that does not register in development indicators but nevertheless is having a positive effect on the lives of the women it assists.
But while positives steps are being made towards gender-focused development and women’s empowerment, there is still a long way to go. As several authors point out, genuinely meeting the needs of women within developing Indonesia is going to depend on more than simply continuing current programs. The concerns raised in articles in this edition offer a starting point for the creation of a reworked development agenda that builds on the lessons of the past in an attempt to achieve genuine gender equity in the future.
Nikki Edwards (nedw8099@uni.sydney.edu.au) completed Honours in Indonesian Studies at the University of Sydney and is now a Juris Doctor candidate at the University of New South Wales.
Indonesian women have been the target of hundreds of gender-focused development programs but to what effect?
Over recent decades Indonesia’s 120 million women have been the target of a veritable barrage of gender-focused development initiatives designed to help reach the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goal of achieving ‘gender equity’ by 2015. Yet as this deadline looms, has the situation for women really improved? Are women any better equipped to gain access to work, healthcare, resources or government support?
Nikki Edwards
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Mixed reactions as women document a community development initiative in Bangka BelitungNikki Edwards |
Rosser sets the scene, writing about how government schemes which provide maternal healthcare to low-income women fail to provide an adequate level of support. He contends that these schemes cannot be fixed with more funding alone, but that they must also concentrate on empowering the mothers they aim to help. In the second article, Ford argues that although labour force participation is improving for women in Indonesia, the effect is not empowering for women across the board, leaving working-class women to shoulder much of the burden of development.
Shifting the focus to consider the effect of development programs more specifically, Elmhirst contends that many gender-focused environmental initiatives fail to address the fundamental unsustainability of exploitative economic development. She argues that while programs which focus on individualising environmental responsibility are problematic for this reason, there is hope in the form of emerging alliances between environmental NGOs and peasants unions, which are now starting to promote the values of ecofeminism.
Also shining a spotlight on development programs, Idrus is critical of ‘gender mainstreaming’ initiatives which set up special programs for women. She argues that all too often the Indonesian government conflates ‘gender equity’ and ‘women’s empowerment’, with the result that gender concerns are isolated from mainstream development practice. Continuing this close focus on the Indonesian government, Suryakusuma argues that the concept of ‘state ibuism’ – a term she coined over two decades ago – still holds relevance in contemporary Indonesia. She writes that although the role of the state has changed, women are still being constructed to fit into a patriarchal order, which now takes the form of a new state sanctioned version of Islam that is increasingly intruding in women’s lives.
The final two articles offer a more up-beat message. Morton’s article about women’s savings schemes in Sulawesi indicates that these kinds of initiatives can improve the situation for at least some women. She explains that by enabling low-income women to borrow very small amounts of money these schemes not only help improve quality of life but also empower participants. Similarly, Nawilis writes about how an alliance between two NGOs in Nusa Tenggara that is helping to empower female heads of households and promote sustainable technology at the same time. This is another example of the kind of small scale initiative that does not register in development indicators but nevertheless is having a positive effect on the lives of the women it assists.
But while positives steps are being made towards gender-focused development and women’s empowerment, there is still a long way to go. As several authors point out, genuinely meeting the needs of women within developing Indonesia is going to depend on more than simply continuing current programs. The concerns raised in articles in this edition offer a starting point for the creation of a reworked development agenda that builds on the lessons of the past in an attempt to achieve genuine gender equity in the future.
Nikki Edwards (nedw8099@uni.sydney.edu.au) completed Honours in Indonesian Studies at the University of Sydney and is now a Juris Doctor candidate at the University of New South Wales.
Inside Indonesia 109: Jul-Sep 2012{jcomments on}
Inside Indonesia - Labouring for development
Labouring for development:
Their labour force participation rate may still lag well behind that of Indonesian men, but Indonesian women have increasingly made the shift from traditional forms of economic activity to waged work. At a time when the green revolution and increased mechanisation of wet rice agriculture had eliminated many of the tasks traditionally undertaken by rural women, foreign investors began establishing the factories that drew a generation of young women away from the villages into the urban industrial workforce for the first time. Although many working-class women are engaged in informal sector activities like petty trade, millions now occupy low-skilled positions in the light manufacturing industries – particularly in garments and footwear, the industries that have underpinned Indonesia’s foray into export-oriented industrialisation.
Changes in the economy as a result of the subsequent growth of tertiary industries also created new white-collar opportunities for women, who are now well represented in professional and technical occupations. Overall, in 2010, women comprised around 36 per cent of Indonesia’s workforce of almost 113 million. The percentage was much higher among the university educated in paid employment, where women account for over 46 per cent.
The experiences of working class and middle class women could not be more different. Indonesian working women of all classes and levels of education continue to struggle against the glass ceiling. But while wealthy and even lower middle-class working women can achieve a work-life balance almost unheard of in countries like Australia, the industrial poor pay dearly for their economic independence, working long hours in difficult working conditions, only to come home to do their second (or third) shift.
The ability to employ a domestic worker and delegate household tasks makes it possible for these women to avoid the repeated arguments over housework that so often beset two-income households in countries with lower wage differentials. Although Indonesian men have a good reputation for their willingness to contribute to childcare, the home very much remains the responsibility of their wives. But live-in help makes the distribution of housework a moot point. Middle-class women have no need to force conversations with their husbands about who should be putting out the rubbish or doing the dishes. When a household ‘helper’ – or two, or three – takes care of the household chores and looks after the children, both parents have plenty of time for relaxation or other activities.
The very same entrenched social inequalities mean that working-class women have a very different experience of the work–life balance. Without the luxury of a substitute wife, poorer working women have to rely on extended family and neighbours for childcare and must complete the bulk of household tasks before they go to work or upon their return home. If they are lucky, they might have a husband who helps out. But such is the pressure of the double shift in a context where working days regularly extend to 12 hours or more that many Indonesian couples who migrate to the cities for work leave their children with grandparents or other members of their extended family, visiting only irregularly outside the holiday period that surrounds the celebrations at the end of the fasting month. Given the subsistence level of wages in Indonesian factories, they often have little money to send home, relying instead on their parents or other relatives to provide for their children.
The terrible situations experienced by some Indonesian women working overseas as domestic helpers are well-publicised, leading to regular expressions of public indignation and occasionally new attempts to better regulate their working conditions. Much less public energy, however, is expended on the plight of domestic workers in Indonesia itself. In part, the argument goes, this is because domestic workers suffer less in familiar surroundings, among their own people. Yet many domestic workers employed by other Indonesians not only travel far from home, and rely on their employer’s goodwill for a return ticket, but are subject to the same kind of indignities that beset their sisters overseas.
Overseas domestic workers play Russian roulette when they decide to go abroad. They might strike it lucky, and get a fair employer, but there is also a chance that they’ll end up deeply scarred or even dead. But if things works out, a sojourn overseas at least offers some hope of socio-economic advancement – if not for themselves, then for their children, whose schooling is paid for from their mother’s hard-earned remittances. By contrast, domestic workers employed in Indonesia earn a pittance, which condemns them to a life of servitude and their children to a life of poverty.
Why, then, are the very public campaigns about overseas domestic workers not matched by campaigns for the rights of those who keep Indonesia’s middle-class households ticking over? Is it because the employment of ‘helpers’ in Indonesia presents a far more complicated picture to its middle classes, who themselves benefit from others’ domestic labour, than that of Indonesian domestic workers abroad? Or are they truly blind to the plight of the women who raise their children and run their homes? The answer is probably somewhere in between. But until ‘helpers’ are legally recognised as workers with rights and responsibilities, and not dependents who should be grateful for being taken in, Indonesia’s burgeoning middle classes will continue to contribute to a devastating cycle of exploitation, which doesn’t sit well with Indonesia’s proudly-held middle income status.
Michele Ford (michele.ford@sydney.edu.au) teaches Indonesian Studies at the University of Sydney. She is co-editor (with Lyn Parker) of Women and Work in Indonesia (Routledge 2008).
Working-class women, especially domestic workers, have borne much of the burden of achieving Indonesia’s middle-income country status
Michele Ford
 |
Working-class women bear the brunt in an unequal societyMichele Ford |
Changes in the economy as a result of the subsequent growth of tertiary industries also created new white-collar opportunities for women, who are now well represented in professional and technical occupations. Overall, in 2010, women comprised around 36 per cent of Indonesia’s workforce of almost 113 million. The percentage was much higher among the university educated in paid employment, where women account for over 46 per cent.
The experiences of working class and middle class women could not be more different. Indonesian working women of all classes and levels of education continue to struggle against the glass ceiling. But while wealthy and even lower middle-class working women can achieve a work-life balance almost unheard of in countries like Australia, the industrial poor pay dearly for their economic independence, working long hours in difficult working conditions, only to come home to do their second (or third) shift.
Outsourcing the double burden
Wealthier working women benefit immensely from the vast inequalities that continue to beset Indonesia. In effect, it is this inequality that allows those who work outside the home to formally take responsibility for the management of the household but without having to come home to the second shift.The ability to employ a domestic worker and delegate household tasks makes it possible for these women to avoid the repeated arguments over housework that so often beset two-income households in countries with lower wage differentials. Although Indonesian men have a good reputation for their willingness to contribute to childcare, the home very much remains the responsibility of their wives. But live-in help makes the distribution of housework a moot point. Middle-class women have no need to force conversations with their husbands about who should be putting out the rubbish or doing the dishes. When a household ‘helper’ – or two, or three – takes care of the household chores and looks after the children, both parents have plenty of time for relaxation or other activities.
The very same entrenched social inequalities mean that working-class women have a very different experience of the work–life balance. Without the luxury of a substitute wife, poorer working women have to rely on extended family and neighbours for childcare and must complete the bulk of household tasks before they go to work or upon their return home. If they are lucky, they might have a husband who helps out. But such is the pressure of the double shift in a context where working days regularly extend to 12 hours or more that many Indonesian couples who migrate to the cities for work leave their children with grandparents or other members of their extended family, visiting only irregularly outside the holiday period that surrounds the celebrations at the end of the fasting month. Given the subsistence level of wages in Indonesian factories, they often have little money to send home, relying instead on their parents or other relatives to provide for their children.
A guilty silence?
At the very bottom of the food chain are the women who keep the houses of others, be those houses in Indonesia or overseas. Working hidden from the public gaze, these women have even fewer guarantees of their safety and well-being than women labouring in the factories. It is not uncommon for domestic workers to be on call 24 hours seven days a week. They are not only expected to do set tasks like the cooking and cleaning, but to respond to their employers’ every whim. In the worst of cases, they might be imprisoned, sexually exploited, maimed or even killed.The terrible situations experienced by some Indonesian women working overseas as domestic helpers are well-publicised, leading to regular expressions of public indignation and occasionally new attempts to better regulate their working conditions. Much less public energy, however, is expended on the plight of domestic workers in Indonesia itself. In part, the argument goes, this is because domestic workers suffer less in familiar surroundings, among their own people. Yet many domestic workers employed by other Indonesians not only travel far from home, and rely on their employer’s goodwill for a return ticket, but are subject to the same kind of indignities that beset their sisters overseas.
Overseas domestic workers play Russian roulette when they decide to go abroad. They might strike it lucky, and get a fair employer, but there is also a chance that they’ll end up deeply scarred or even dead. But if things works out, a sojourn overseas at least offers some hope of socio-economic advancement – if not for themselves, then for their children, whose schooling is paid for from their mother’s hard-earned remittances. By contrast, domestic workers employed in Indonesia earn a pittance, which condemns them to a life of servitude and their children to a life of poverty.
Why, then, are the very public campaigns about overseas domestic workers not matched by campaigns for the rights of those who keep Indonesia’s middle-class households ticking over? Is it because the employment of ‘helpers’ in Indonesia presents a far more complicated picture to its middle classes, who themselves benefit from others’ domestic labour, than that of Indonesian domestic workers abroad? Or are they truly blind to the plight of the women who raise their children and run their homes? The answer is probably somewhere in between. But until ‘helpers’ are legally recognised as workers with rights and responsibilities, and not dependents who should be grateful for being taken in, Indonesia’s burgeoning middle classes will continue to contribute to a devastating cycle of exploitation, which doesn’t sit well with Indonesia’s proudly-held middle income status.
Michele Ford (michele.ford@sydney.edu.au) teaches Indonesian Studies at the University of Sydney. She is co-editor (with Lyn Parker) of Women and Work in Indonesia (Routledge 2008).
Inside Indonesia 109: Jul-Sep 2012
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Erdogan: There is No Kurdish Issue in Turkey any more - Journal of Turkish Weekly
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Iraqi Kurdistan to keep pumping oil to September 15: sources - Reuters
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Read full article >>
In the battle between airlines and airports for your dining dollar, the balance of power has clearly shifted to land-based meals, which, despite their typically inflated prices, are increasingly following trends in the wider world of gastronomy: Food developed by celebrity chefs. Food with local flavor. Even food cooked with garden-fresh ingredients.
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The new generation of airports
The new generation of airports:
After a round of golf, an Imax movie, a tea-making demo and an omelet stuffed with baby oysters, you might forget the pressing reason for being here at the Hong Kong airport: to catch a flight.
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Read full article >>
After a round of golf, an Imax movie, a tea-making demo and an omelet stuffed with baby oysters, you might forget the pressing reason for being here at the Hong Kong airport: to catch a flight.
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Read full article >>
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