Jakarta (Bill Gates, food, OPEC, the tallest building in SE Asia)

Jakarta

From CNET Asia

Bill Gates scheduled to visit Jakarta on May 8 …> go to article

Budi Putra

May 7, 2008 16:59

“Microsoft Corporation founder and chairman Bill Gates is scheduled to visit Indonesia on May 8 to 9, 2008. According to Coordinating Minister for People’s Welfare Aburizal Barkrie, Gates will be visiting Indonesia to reciprocate President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s tour of the Microsoft headquarters in Seattle last year.

Gates will address a plenum of the GLF (Government Leaders Forum) along with Yudhoyono on Friday, May 9. Besides attending the GLF, Gates is also expected to become a speaker at the Presidential Lecture program at the Jakarta Convention Center on Friday. GLF Asia 2008 will discuss about the “Serving the Citizen: The Transformative Power of Information Technology in Delivering Government Services”.

As reported by Antara News Agency, Gates will also talk to the Indonesian Government about the development of bird flu vaccines in Indonesia. He will also endorse the Visit Indonesia Year 2008 campaign, according to news portal Detik. This plan was revealed by Minister Aburizal during a press conference with Trade Minister Marie E. Pangestu and Microsoft Indonesia president director Tony Chen.

“We hope Gates’s presence here will give a positive image for the country’s tourism,” Aburizal said.

But the bird flu vaccines and tourism issue are not top priorities that I want to hear from Gates during his visit here. I want to know his answers to:

1. How much he (or his company) will invest here in supporting Indonesia’s next digital decade.
2. What the future projects are which fit in with his ideas on creating the Asian Miracle.
3. Whether he thinks Indonesia can be the next Asian miracle in terms of a digital world.
4. What Microsoft’s solutions and approaches are in combatting software piracy in Indonesia. (Indonesia has long been fighting software piracy problems. As written by The Jakarta Post, IDC reported that Indonesia had reduced its software piracy rate by 2 percent from 87 percent in 2003 to 85 percent in 2006).
5. Can his foundation support, well, the country’s open source movement?

I am not sure I can attend all his lectures and sessions because until today, my name was still on the waiting list to get an official badge to enter the forum.

But no problem. At least, I hope other participants will ask (if possible) the above questions I have.

Welcome to Indonesia, Mr Gates! Selamat datang”.

Yes, welcome to Indonesia Mr. Gates.  I hope you take the time to at least get out of the air conditioning for an hour or two and REALLY see Jakarta.  Why not cut away from hanging out with government elites and head down one Jalan Tikus to a kampung in West Jakarta, one by the canal? Try to find some clean drinking water. Or why not visit a school? Try to find one that is not in disrepair, has books, has chalk for the blackboards, or has a computer, even just an old one, that is connected to the internet with more than the ability to download 1MB in an hour. Of course there is plenty of MS sofware at hand. It’s cheap and generally unlicensed in Indonesia. And PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE keep a safe distance from that Bakrie fellow.

Or why not take the time to listen to Rebcca Henschke’s excellent report  on Public Radio International on how the food crisis is effecting the urban poor in Jakarta.  You can listen to this broadcast here …>go to boradcast   This report will freeze you in your tracks and make you wonder where your moral compass went astray.  Or here is an article from the AFP which might be of interest.

Rising food, fuel prices drive Indonesian May Day rallies
May 1, 2008

JAKARTA (AFP) - Thousands of Indonesians took to the streets of the capital Jakarta for Labour Day rallies on Thursday, with rising food prices and an expected cut in fuel subsidies weighing heavily on workers’ minds.

Police said about 10,000 people gathered in the city centre and at the presidential palace.

Carrying banners reading “Lower Food Prices Now” and “More Pay for Workers and Farmers,” many of the demonstrators said they were alarmed at soaring inflation and the prospect of sharply higher fuel bills.

“If they keep increasing the price of food, maybe we’ll have to eat less,” factory worker Lia said.

“The price of formula milk for the baby has gone up. It’s now 36,000 rupiah (nearly four dollars) for a can of 600 grams and the baby drinks it up in two days,” she said”. …> go to article

But don’t worry, on the upside Indonesia has plenty of oil… or…

From The Times of India …> go to article

JAKARTA (INDONESIA): “President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said on Tuesday that Indonesia was considering of quitting the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) because it was no longer a net oil exporter.

“Our wells are drying,” he said, adding that the country needs to concentrate on increasing domestic production, which has dropped to less than a million barrels a day even as consumption is rising.

The government opened talks on Monday on whether it “should continue to stay with OPEC or withdraw its membership until it reaches a point where it deserves to rejoin that organization again,” Yudhoyono told agencies around Indonesia.

The country of 235 million people is Southeast Asia’s only OPEC member. But it has to import oil because of decades of declining investment in exploration and extraction due to corruption and a weak legal system that makes oil companies wary of doing business here. Indonesia’s oil output has declined steadily from oil production of 1.5 million to 1.6 million barrels a day in the mid-1990s. It produced around 860,000 barrels a day of crude oil last month and recorded a deficit of $794 million in its oil trade accounts.

It is not the first time the country has re-evaluated its OPEC membership, but in past years teams commissioned by the government have recommended staying in the grouping to maintain good relations with other oil producers”.

 But with Lion Air purchasing 56 new Boeing 737s, a growth rate running at 7% in 2007, Jakarta accounting for half of Indonesia’s GNP,  building construction booming in the city, and global oil demand skyrocketing,  is it no wonder the wells are drying up?

And so this just what  Jakarta REALLY needs…

From Asia Propety Report

Jakarta to get SE Asia’s tallest tower …> go to article
by Asia Pulse

“Dubai-based real estate giant Emaar Properties plans to build a landmark tower in Jakarta, to be the tallest skyscraper in Southeast Asia, a presidential envoy said. Special envoy for Middle East Alwi Shihab said on Monday Emaar Chairman Mohamed Ali Alabbar had proposed the project to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono during an informal meeting Saturday. At the moment, we are still looking for the right location in Jakarta for the project, Alwi told the newspaper The Jakarta Post.

Emaar, the largest land and real estate developer in the Gulf is famed for its on going construction in Dubai of the 718-meter tall Burj Dubai, which would be the tallest skyscraper in the world. In March, Emaar signed a joint venture agreement with state-owned Bali Tourism Development Corp. to build an integrated tourism project in southern Lombok, Bali´s neighboring island”.

 

 

Jakarta (internet censorship)

The news that a number of web sites are going down due to RI government decree is all over the Indonesian blogs this morning.  I am busy processing photos and video so my posting is quite limited but I highly recommend taking a look at Avianto’s journal. Great piece of writing there.  Jakartass also has some choice words.

In a related article in Japan Focus this article by Andre Vitchek is also well worth your time. The New Face of Indonesia’s Islamic Fundamentalism: Pornography Ban Ignores the Starving

Then there is this from Aliran

Tuesday, 08 April 2008

Fifteen people from six countries were arrested today in Jakarta (Indonesia) by Polda Jaya (the Police Corps of Jakarta Raya Territory) for participating in a peaceful people’s gathering to voice their protest against GM rice and call for saving the diversity of local rice to ensure people’s food security.  As you see Jakarta is a rather busy kind of place…

 

As for me I am out in the streets of Jakarta.  Though I have been here many times I am being reminded (once again) how much this city can kick your ass.

 

Jakarta (informal) part 2

Photo by Qusing 

Economics is the social science that studies the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Greek for oikos (house) and nomos (custom or law), hence “rules of the house(hold).” …> go to site

Economics at its most basic might be thought of as the ways in which we make a living. The economy can also be described in terms  of the relationships between supply and demand.

 The rules of the household (a few examples)

Begging

One evening while taking the new communter train from Jakarta to Depok with my friend Budi I noticed a man several cars down crawling along the floor of the train carriage. He would stop occasionally and collect a few coins or rupiah form the commuters. Others ignorded him.  As he approached where we were sitting I reached into my pocket for the stack of coins which I had been accumulating through the day.  He held out his hand and I gave him the coins.  Budi did nothing. The man moved on.  Budi then told me, “Maybe if you follow him home you will see what a nice house he lives in“.  I took this to mean that the man was either faking his disability or he was some sort of professional beggar working his audience.  Shortly after that the train made a stop and a young blind man with his mother walked on board.  He had strapped on his back a small portable karioki machine and proceeded to sing into his microphone with a very good voice.  At this Budi reached into his pocket and handed over his coins.  Budi could tell the difference.  I could not. It is still hard to this day.

There are an estimated 200,000 street vendors in Jakarta each month they pay out about $1.5 billion rupiah for protection, in extortion, or for illegal fees. There are perhaps 80,000 street kids who make their living by begging.

In Spetmeber 2007, the Jakarta City Council approved a bylaw that bans busking, begging and street hawking as well as banning people from giving money to beggars, vendors and hawkers.

Initiated by the city’s departing governor, Sutioyoso, the bylaw says that anyone who is caught giving money to beggars, and others of their ilk, will be fined of 50 million rupiah.From World Street Children News …>go to site 

Mohammad Yazid, Jakarta

“A beggar recently scolded my wife for refusing to give him some money at a busy intersection in Cempaka Putih (famously known as Coca-Cola intersection), Central Jakarta.

“How stingy, so what’s the headscarf for?” he said to my wife. I told my wife not to roll down the car window because I was afraid he was a crook.

Bluffing and smirking have become forms of pressure exerted by beggars operating at nearly every crossroad in Jakarta.

They employ various other methods at other places such as public transportation and residential areas. Some use the conventional style of pretending to be starving or seriously ill, while others apply the criminal way of extorting money from passengers by appearing as alcoholics or newly released convicts.

Women have an effective trick of approaching benevolent people and exploiting the innocent looks of children under the age of five and carrying “hired infants” at Jakarta intersections.

There is no official data on the total number of beggars in Jakarta, but according to Suciardi, head of the commercial sex rehabilitation service at the Jakarta Social Welfare Office, their numbers increase by 40 percent during Ramadhan through Idul Fitri, from the 2,295 normally found in the city.

Chairman of the National Commission for Child Protection, Seto Mulyadi, said the number of street children in Greater Jakarta reached 80,000.

Amid the prevailing economic difficulties and different mishaps affecting Indonesia, many people choose begging as their profession, because they often make more than those who work at government offices or private businesses. Earning about Rp 50,000 to Rp 75,000 daily on average, in a month a beggar can make Rp 1.5 million, far more than Jakarta’s minimum wage of Rp 900,000″.

 Black Markets

Begging, of course, is small change compared to Jakarta’s black markets. Havoscope Global Black Market Indexes lists  the market value of Indonesia’s black market at $3.32 billion (US). The counterfeit goods market value (books, cable, music, movies, and computer software) is listed at $458 million (US).  Black market handphone sales may be as high as $370 million (US). The value of the illegal drug trade is not listed but may also be in the millions of dollars as is indicated by the  recent incident of 600,000 ecstasy pills seized from a shop-house in Cengkareng, Tangerang district, Banten province, last February 26.

Human Trafficking

 from Human Trafficking.org

“Indonesia is primarily a source, but also a transit and destination country for human trafficking. UNICEF estimates that 100,000 women and children are trafficked annually for commercial sexual exploitation in Indonesia and abroad, 30 percent of the female prostitutes in Indonesia are below 18, and 40,000-70,000 Indonesian children are victims of sexual exploitation. The East Java Children’s Protection Agency estimates that at least 100,000 women and children are trafficked annually from, through, and to East Java.

Indonesian women and children are trafficked for sexual and labor exploitation in Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Taiwan, Japan, Hong Kong, and the Middle East.  A significant number of Indonesian women voluntarily migrate to work as domestic servants but are later coerced into abusive conditions. Some Indonesian women are recruited by false promises of employment and are later coerced into prostitution or forced labor. Ethnic Chinese women and teenage girls in the West Kalimantan district are recruited as mail-order brides for men in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore.

Indonesian women from the Riau Islands, Bali, and Lombok are used for sex tourists from Malaysia and Singapore”.

 from Fact book on Global Sexual Exploitation - Indonesia

“A 1992 survey showed that one out of 10 prostituted persons was under age 17, and that one out of five of those older than that age said they took up prostitution before they reached 17. (Dario Agnote, “Sex trade key part of S.E. Asian economies, study says,” Kyodo News, 18 August 199

The sex industry accounts for an estimated 1.2 billion dollars to 3.3 billion dollars in annual earnings, or between 0.8 and 2.4% of the country’s GDP, the study said. In Jakarta alone, prostitution-related activities are estimated to be worth 91 million dollars annually. (Dario Agnote, “Sex trade key part of S.E. Asian economies, study says,” Kyodo News, 18 August 199

There are between 140,000 and 230,000 prostituted persons in Indonesia (1993-1994 estimates). Prostituted persons are mainly adult women, but there are also male, transvestite and child prostitutes, both girls and boys. (International Labor Organization. Dario Agnote, “Sex trade key part of S.E. Asian economies, study says,” Kyodo News, 18 August 199

There are at least 650,000 prostitutes in Indonesia. In 1998 there were 150,000 registered prostitutes compared to 72,000 in 1995. 30 percent are children. (Yogyakarta Free Children Society, Mohammad Farid, “Indonesian economic crisis boosts prostitution,” Reuters, 26 July 199

There were 65,582 registered prostitutes in 1994. The highest estimate is 500,000 women in prostitution. (CATW - Asia Pacific, Trafficking in Women and Prostitution in the Asia Pacific)

About 200 prostituted women in Jakarta, Indonesia, protesting plans by the mayor to close down their complex carried signs stating “I did not want to become a prostitute. The economic difficulties have made me a prostitute.” (”Indonesian prostitutes join wave of protests,” Reuters, 2 July 199

Earnings from prostitution average $600 a month in Indonesia and are higher than in other unskilled jobs. (International Labor Organization, Elif Kaban, “UN labour body urges recognition of sex industry,” Reuters, 18 August 199

Particularly because of the economic crises in Asia, women in Thailand and Indonesia are increasingly forced into prostitution as the only means of survival. (”Women Workers Are Last in, First Out,” Associated Press, 30 April 199

In Indonesia the economic crisis has driven thousands of women into prostitution for economic survival. Although “streetwalkers” are prohibited in Jakarta, there is no law prohibiting the sale of sexual services. (Yogyakarta Free Children Society, Mohammad Farid, “Indonesian economic crisis boosts prostitution,” Reuters, 26 July 199

The sex industry takes in US$ 1.2 - US$ 3.6 billion. (CATW - Asia Pacific, Trafficking in Women and Prostitution in the Asia Pacific)

The city of Surbaya, with tens of thousands of prostitutes, is the largest sex industry center in South East Asia, which consists of hectares and hectares of modest houses with large, plate-glass windows where bored girls sit waiting: “streets full of human aquariums”. It is also a magnet for the divorced and dispossessed women of the strict Islamic villages. The sex industry serves as a source of women for prostitution in provincial towns, through a black market network of pimps. (Louise Williams, “Sex in the Cemetary,” Sydney Morning Herald, 25 January 1997)

30% of the girls in Semarang, Indonesia who are homeless are forced into prostitution for survival. (University Diponegoro study, Nicholas D. Kristof “Asian Crisis Deals Setbacks to Women”).

Other sites (grim and enlightening) addressing this issue are at:

 Child Prostituion - Indonesia

Intersections: Traditional and Emergent Sex Work in Urban Indonesia

Then there are these sites. 

Best Ladies Escort Agency in Jakarta

Travel Sex Guide Indonesia

Jakarta After Dark

And…finally

from AFP Penises and Prayer Mats: Its Sexual Healing Indonesian Style

“A consultation with Haji Baban is an encounter with the arcane. Sitting cross-legged in semi-darkness, the patient is asked to detail his wishes with the visual aid of a selection of carved wooden phalluses.

Then comes the diagnosis, delivered after a contemplative silence.

Solemnly, Haji Baban intones that the client’s appendage is “fairly average,” and offers to conjour up a six-centimetre (2.3-inch) extension.

The prescription for such whopping growth is a 10-day course of eating and drinking mystery concoctions and secret potions, with the first dose of bitter berries to be taken immediately, washed down with dark brown liquid.

An assistant then brings a phallus-shaped bamboo tube containing a roll of sticky coconut rice that has to be swallowed whole to avoid what Haji Baban describes ominously as “terrible genital consequences”.

Haji Baban ends the consultation with a vegetable oil that the client must promise to apply daily with a specific hand action from base to tip. And no eating green bananas or citronella, he orders.

The daily cost for treatment is between 700,000 and one million rupees (70-100 dollars), depending on the options selected.

This is a hefty sum for many in Indonesia but the imposing mansions being built around Caringin seem to indicate that plenty of men are willing to pay.

A local motorcycle taxi driver gestures to the newly-built homes and says: “They belong to Mak Erot.”

A Last Note

From begging to the black market to human trafficking to penis enlargement. Such are the rules of the Indonesian household. 

I suppose I should be editorializing or moralizing at this point.  In this post I have moved from  the lighter side (is there one?) to the darker side (most certainly there is one) of the informal economies of Jakarta.   I now see that this was sort of an inevitable progression. As it is with all households everything is connected to everything else. It is there in the tension between the rich and poor, the politics and economics of gender, the educated and the uneducated, those with power and those who are disenfranchised. 

As Mary S. Zurbuchen writes in Images of Culture and National Development in Indonesia: The Cockroach Opera, “if the poor of Jakarta are like cockroaches, then these purportedly disgusting insects, instead of signifying filth and being driven from sight, must be welcomed. Victorious and pervasive, they persist everywhere, from the sprawling marbel villas of luxury housing estates like Pondok Indah to the immense slums of Tanjung Priok. The roach should not be counted a symbol of the lowlife here but rather a ubiquitous survivor of thousands of fantasies of ultimate extermination”.   

And still, time after time Susan Abeyasekere’s words from Jakarta: A History just won’t go away, “the central fallacy [of Jakarta] which has persisted from 1619 to the present is that it is possible to create a city for the privileged few, cut off from the countryside and the majority of the poor”.  

This goes to the who, what, why, and where of Jakarta’s informal economies. And it is clear, as the reality of the city declares,  that it is not possible to create a city for “the privileged few”.

It is true for Jakarta as it is for any place else you can point to on the planet.

Money, money, money

 Photo: The Jakarta Post

Welfare minister tops Indonesian rich list: Forbes

12 hours ago

JAKARTA (AFP) — Indonesia’s welfare minister and his family, under fire for their company’s role in an oozing mud volcano that has displaced thousands, has topped Forbes Asia’s 2007 Indonesia rich list, the magazine said Thursday.

Aburizal Bakrie and his family saw their net worth blow out to 5.4 billion dollars this year, up from 1.2 billion dollars in 2006 when they were sixth on the list, according to the title’s December 24 edition.

The largest contributor to their wealth gain came from surging stock prices in Bakrie Group’s largest holding, coal producer Bumi Resources, it reported.

Bakrie has faced sustained criticism over the role his part-owned company Lapindo Brantas played in triggering the mud volcano in Sidoarjo, East Java, which began spurting in May 2006 during exploratory gas drilling by Lapindo.

While many experts say the company’s negligence led to the flow, Lapindo maintains that it was caused by a nearby earthquake.

Some 10,000 victims have been told to accept compensation from Lapindo for their land, with no payout for other losses such as houses and material goods. …> read full article here