Indonesia Meets Three Targets of MDGs

Jakarta - The National Development Planning Board (Bappenas) has said that the government has achieved three targets of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). "In trying to meet its commitment on the MDGs, Indonesia has faced big challenges, such as free trade, oil price fluctuation, climate change and global warming impacts, as well as the European economic crisis," National Development Planning Minister/Chairperson of Bappenas, Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana said in a press statement here on Wednesday. Indonesia's achievements include the decline in the proportion of people with per capita income of less than one US dollar per day, gender equality indicated by the net enrollment ratios of girls to boys in high schools and the literacy rate ratio of women to men. The Indonesian government has also successfully reduced the prevalence of tuberculosis. The status of the MDGs' target achievement could be categorized into three groups, namely targets that have been achieved; targets which have indicated significant progress and are expected to be achieved by 2015; and targets that still need hard work to achieve. The country has made significant improvement in its efforts to reduce the prevalence of underweight children below five years of age. Other areas of progress include the net enrollment rate in primary education, the net enrollment ratio of girls to boys in secondary high school and higher education, reduction in the infant mortality rate and the development of open, rule-based, predictable and non-discriminatory trading and financial system. Despite some improvement, Indonesia needs to work harder to achieve its targets in reducing the poverty rate, maternal mortality rate, HIV/AIDS prevalence, greenhouse gases and increasing the number of households with safe drinking water and families having access to basic sanitation. Among internal challenges facing the country, while trying to achieve the MDGs, are inter-regional gaps in MDGs achievement. These are socio-economic in nature, as well as those of gender. Indonesia is also facing a lack of resources for the implementation of mainstreaming strategy of MDGs into regional governments' policies, and a lack of data and information on the MDGs achievements at district/city level. The synergy between the local and central governments is also not optimal. "Therefore, we need to agree to deal with the challenges by adopting better strategies for the MDG target implementation and achieving better synergy between the regional and central governments, in order to achieve the MDGs," the minister said. (*)