Rural Developments for Progress
The latest reports on development, which falls under the coordination of the Villages, Development of Disadvantaged Areas and Transmigration Ministry to the yearend, is encouraging. If everything proceeds without disruption from the political year, accelerated development in this five-year period will improve the human development index (HDI) at the beginning of 2019.
The magnitude of successful progress in village infrastructure development, which affects the lives of many rural people, cannot be counted on the fingers or covered in a news broadcast, because it is growing in leaps and bounds across the regions. Progress has been so amazing that an official statement must be constantly updated with the latest information from other regions before it can be read.
For example, out of the 66,883 drinking water units needed in a 2014 estimate, 58,884 units have been installed in 2014-2018, so that only 8,399 units remain to be fulfilled in 2019. In improving clean water and sanitation, 942,927 clean water and sanitation units have been built in rural areas in the last three years, in addition to 37,662 wells, 24,005,604 meters of drainage, and 178,344 MCK (bathing, washing, toilet) facilities in tens of thousands of villages throughout Indonesia.
Improving sanitation has a direct impact on the population’s health and life expectancy. Especially among young people, it will have a direct impact on mortality rates, which are usually dominated by children and toddlers (under 5 years old) who die at an early age because of unclean drinking water and poor sanitation. Moreover, 18,477 posyandu (integrated health posts) have been established to provide basic treatment to toddlers of poor families.
Before 2000, posyandu services were provided only through community facilities, and typically without direct government assistance. Developing posyandu certainly helps to reduce the mortality rates of infants and young children, which usually contribute significantly to national mortality, which ultimately lowers the HDI. The long-term implications of developing vital facilities are highly significant if they are accompanied with family education programs on their use.
Increasing HDI
In 2014, 10,819 villages needed infrastructure development to enable their residents to reach the nearest health facilities; of these, more than half were met in 2014-2018. Out of the need for 69,537 doctors, nurses and other caregivers, 54,921 have been provided, with the remaining 14,616 to be met by 2019.
The demand for ease of access to medical facilities In 2014 comprised 58,100 poskesdes (village health posts), polindes (village maternity posts) and posyandu, of which 51,325 facilities have been met in the last four years, with the remaining 5,775 facilities to be fulfilled by 2019. This provision adds to
Indonesia’s life expectancy, which has already been greatly boosted by our success in reducing birth rates by more than half in 1970.
With regard to efforts in education – the second component of the HDI – 33,357 early childhood institutions (PAUD) were needed in 2014, and 24,481 PAUD were provided in 2014-2018; the remaining 8,896 PAUD should be provided in 2019. Similarly, 27,782 senior high schools (SMA), vocational schools (SMK) and madrasah aliah (MA; Islamic high schools) were needed. Of these, 19,488 schools have been provided, with the remaining 8,294 schools expected to be completed in 2019.
School development has been very quick, with 48,694 PAUD built over the past three years in more than half the villages in the archipelago. The development of educational facilities for toddlers has been accompanied by efforts to meet the educational needs of teenagers who have never attended school through the development of community learning centers (PKBM) and ABC high school equivalency programs. Of the total demand for 58,339 PKBM, 44,295 centers have been completed, with the remaining 14,044 centers to be completed in 2019.
The establishment of nearly 50,000 PAUDs and PKBMs has a highly significant and double impact in boosting the HDI. One, it gives married women of poor and near-poor households in rural areas the opportunity to seek outside employment to help their husbands as secondary earners in increasing household incomes. Two, it also increases the population’s mean years of schooling (MYS), which was not taken into account before, because MYS for the Indonesian population was previously measured only through basic education, or the elementary school level.
Rural women who are provided with an opportunity to work benefit further from improvements to 158,619 kilometers of rural roads and 1,027,225 meters of rural bridges, as well as 6,952 open village markets, which provide additional infrastructure for husbands and wives in transporting their children to posyandu and in sending them to PAUD. Therefore, young married women with toddlers need not worry about taking their children to school, and – along with their husbands – they can work calmly as part of the productive population while increasing their family\'s income.
Meanwhile, it was estimated in 2014 that 39,341 village markets were needed, of which 26,593 markets were met in 2014-2018. The remaining 12,748 markets will be fulfilled by 2019. The 2014 estimated demand for warung (shop stalls) was 73,078 stalls, of which 69,705 stalls have been built with the remaining 3,373 stalls to be fulfilled by 2019, providing opportunity for profit among new entrepreneurs in rural areas.
Prosperous families
Moreover, young people do not need to leave their hometowns because 11,399 sports facilities have been provided, which can also be used as cultural and arts venues for rural youths. As a result, of the 59,677 sports groups that existed at the beginning of 2014, 45,770 sports groups have been active over the last three years towards the expectation that sports and arts will improve, and thus raise the quality of human resources.
The demand for a quality workforce cannot be sidelined. Therefore, almost all institutions have started providing regular training for people who want to progress quickly.
The government has also encouraged the provision of reading materials that can be accessed easily through the digital catalog of the National Library, which is developing digital reading materials for the current revolution in technological development. Of the 65,571 rural public libraries (TBM) needed, 53,305 TBM have been provided with the remaining 12,366 TBM to be completed in 2019. Moreover, all reading materials can be downloaded on the smart phones that have penetrated rural populations.
All citizens should follow the developments across the archipelago so that our beloved country of Indonesia will progress rapidly into a nation where the people and their families can progress and prosper. (Haryono Suyono, Former Coordinating Minister for People\'s Welfare and Poverty Alleviation)