A World Bank report “Economic Impact of Sanitation in Southeast Asia” said that, compared to other Southeast Asian countries, Indonesia experienced the highest economic impact from its poor sanitation. The annual economic impact on health, water, the environment, human welfare and tourism is approximately US$6.3 billion in Indonesia, $1.4 billion in the Philippines, $780 million in Vietnam and $450 million in Cambodia. Indonesian loses the equivalent of Rp 265,000 per capita annually. The report stated that more than 94 million of Indonesia’s population does not have adequate sanitary facilities causing, as a result, 121,100 cases of diarrhea, with 50.000 deaths every year.
"Economic Impacts of Sanitation in Southeast Asia" World Bank WSP Research Report February 2008
http://www.wsp.org/UserFiles/file/Sanitation_Impact_Synthesis_2.pdf
Now let us look at the government’s National Medium-Term Development Plan for 2004-2009 (RPJMN) as stipulated in the 2005 presidential regulation. The document maps in detail the planned targets to be achieved by 2009 for several sectors, including water and sanitation. In the water and sanitation sector, the government intended to increase piped water coverage in 2009 to 66 percent in cities and 30 percent in villages. As for sanitation, the government had an ambitious plan that the country would have private sanitation facilities for all by the end of 2009.
Based on data gathered by the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), we can conclude that the government has failed to achieve its target.The percentage of people with access to piped water is even decreasing.In 2006, 17.9 percent of the population already had access to piped water, in 2007 the number increased to 18.3 percent, but in 2008, the percentage dropped to 16.1 percent.
Data from the national socioeconomic survey 2007 also conducted by the BPS, showed a worse situation, with only 12.3 percent of the population having access to metered piped water and 3.8 percent having to rely on piped retail payment. In the provinces of Bangka and Belitung Islands, Riau and Lampung, access to piped water is even less than 2 percent.For national sanitation coverage, 33 percent of village populations still do not have private sanitation facilities in their homes, a situation that puts Indonesia amongst the worst in Asia.
The huge gap between achievement and target (especially, the achievement in the water sector which is, in fact, less than half its target) is surely nothing to be proud of. We need to bear in mind that in five years the Millennium Development Goals will be evaluated and it will very difficult to achieve the national target coverage of 57.4 percent in 2015 if there is no significant improvement in effort and budget allocation. Ever since the Republic’s independence, until Abdurrahman Wahid’s presidency in 2000, Indonesia has achieved the highest coverage rate of piped water connections with 19.2 percent of the population having access to piped water.
The implication behind the proportional numbers with access is very important and broad; the limited access to water and sanitation forces people to use water from unsafe sources that is usually contaminated by pollutants, including human waste. The safe distance between a water source and a septic tank is 10 meters, but due to population density in big cities in Indonesia, it is very likely that many household water sources are contaminated with pollutants from neighbors’ sewers, or even their own. In Jakarta, the Environmental Agency (Bappedal) this year announced that 94 percent of its groundwater is no longer safe as a drinking water source as it is contaminated, particularly with Escherichia coli bacteria. With only 24 percent of the population of Jakarta having access to piped water, we can be sure that most Jakartans consume polluted water every day.
A breakthrough is surely needed for the 2009-2014 period. The government needs to avoid ambitious but unrealistic targets.
Accurate and precise budget allocations for sectors with a high multiplier effect, like water and sanitation, need to be prioritized.There is a need to balance the allocation for the three biggest infrastructure expenditures: roads, irrigation, and water and sanitation. So far, roads always get the biggest budget portion, while water and sanitation get the smallest bite.
Nila Ardhianie "Failure to achieve the water and sanitation targets" Jakarta Post 5th Oct 2009
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2009/10/05/failure-achieve-water-and-...