Muhammadiyah Appoints Actress to Spread Word on Tuberculosis Danger

The Jakarta Globe

As tuberculosis remains a serious problem across the country, a prominent Muslim organization has appointed an ambassador to begin raising awareness of the debilitating disease.


Aisyiyah, the women’s wing of Muhammadiyah, the second-largest Muslim organization in the country, recently chose actress Mediana Hutomo to inform the public about the dangers of tuberculosis.

Mediana, who was appointed tuberculosis ambassador on Thursday, will spend three months traveling across the archipelago to spread the message about the deadly respiratory disease.

The campaign, which is set to begin late this month, will visit 35 cities and districts in 16 provinces, Aisyiyah chairwoman Noor Rochmah said.

“The reason that we are really concerned about TB [tuberculosis] is because the number of TB cases in Indonesia is quite high,” Noor said on Sunday.

“According to the minister of health, TB causes 346 deaths in Indonesia every day. Therefore, it is very important to raise the awareness among Indonesian society because they do not realize that they may have TB.”

Indonesia has in recent years taken steps to reduce the prevalence of the disease. In December, the Health Ministry said it was optimistic the country could reach the UN Millennium Development Goal on halting and beginning to reverse the incidence of tuberculosis by the 2015 target date.

According to the World Health Organization’s Global Tuberculosis Control data, Indonesia is ranked fifth worldwide in total tuberculosis cases with 429,730. India tops the list, followed by China, South Africa and Nigeria.

That is still a significant improvement from the 2007 figures, when Indonesia’s 528,000 tuberculosis cases placed it third, behind India and China.

Noor said that although Mediana was appointed as Muhammadiyah’s tuberculosis ambassador, she would work with Christian and Buddhist groups to get the word out.

“The main thing here is how society can raise their awareness about TB because so many people sometimes do not recognize TB symptoms, which often appear as an ordinary flu and coughing,” Noor said.

“But as times goes by, the coughing will become coughing blood, the patient will lose weight and it then kills them without being recognized that the coughing was the indication of TB.”

Noor said that after Mediana’s initial three-month tour concludes, the campaign will expand to cover an additional 75 cities and districts starting in July.

Expats in Jakarta Get Their Cricket Fix

The Jakarta Globe

Bhagi Anand has been following cricket most of her life, so there was no way she was going to miss Saturday’s showpiece event.


“I was introduced to cricket when I was a child, and I’m passionate about it,” she said.

However, for an Indian national like Bhagi, who has lived in Jakarta for five years, finding a place to watch cricket matches is never an easy task.

For Saturday’s World Cup final between India and Sri Lanka, she decided to watch the match at a bar in South Jakarta.

“I’ve been following the World Cup this year, and I didn’t want to miss the final,” she said.

“It would’ve been better if I could have gone to Mumbai to watch the game firsthand because it’s more fun.”

Indonesia has always been a football country, and cricket has traditionally struggled for attention, both from sports fans and the media.

This can make it tough for cricket fans here, particularly expatriates from cricket-loving countries such as India, England and Australia, who normally resort to the Internet or match broadcasts at bars or other public establishments for their sporting fix.

Mark Johnson, a British national who works for an oil and gas company in Indonesia, said big tournaments like the World Cup brought out the “nationalistic side” of every fan.

“Although England didn’t make it to the final, I still want to watch the final game,” he said. “It’s because when it comes to cricket, everyone becomes nationalistic about their home teams.”

He said he was rooting for Sri Lanka in the final because he favored underdogs.

India beat Sri Lanka by six wickets to win its second World Cup title.

“Even though I’m a British citizen and I’ve been living in India since I was born and India has a good team, I expected Sri Lanka to win,” Johnson said.

“It would be better for a small country to be the winner sometimes,” he added.

Frederick Alloysius, who works as the quality control officer at Aphrodite, a South Jakarta bar that showed the World Cup final, said there was a healthy number of cricket fans in Jakarta, though not a lot of them were Indonesians.

“In the past few years, the number of cricket fans in the city has increased, especially among the Indian, English and Australian communities,” Alloysius said.

Organic Inspiration for Transmigration

The Jakarta Globe
In a bid to tackle unemployment and increase the nation’s food security level at the same time, the government said on Friday that it was in the process of finalizing a transmigration program involving organic farming. 

According to Central Statistic Agency (BPS) data, Indonesia had 8.9 million unemployed and 35 million economically disadvantaged people as of last year.

At the same time, there are 75.5 million hectares of land that can be used for agriculture but so far, only 25.7 million hectares have been used for that purpose, according to Djoko Sidik Pramono, the director for community development and transmigration locations at the Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration. 

The global “back to nature” movement provided the inspiration for the program, he said. 

“The agriculture-based transmigration programs in the past failed to be as popular as the plantation-based transmigration programs. This was because farming products were less profitable than plantation products,” Djoko told reporters at the ministry.

In the 1980s, President Suharto introduced the agriculture-based transmigration program, in which people from Java were sent to areas in Kalimantan and Sumatra to become farmers. 

Later, more people from various provinces moved to Sumatra and Kalimantan to work on plantations after the price of palm oil started to rise. 

“Considering the recent global rise in consumption of organic products, we are now going to develop an organic agriculture-based transmigration program,” Djoko said. 

The government hopes to reduce unemployment rates among skilled laborers by having educated people join the program.  

“Organic agricultural products now mainly come from the United States, Australia and Europe,” he added. 

“We hope there will be many who would be willing to participate in the transmigration program because [the crops] sell at a high price.” 

The program is also aimed at increasing the nation’s food security level, the official said, as it will help the country become less dependent on imported food commodities. 

The government plans to designate 195 transmigration settlement areas all over Indonesia as part of the program. 

Of those, 44 would be used for organic agriculture while the remainder would be used for conventional farming. 

“As soon as the details of this program have been finalized, we are going to bring it to the people’s attention and we hope to employ 12,500 transmigrants each year from all over Indonesia,” Djoko said. 

Facial Reconstruction Needed After Visit From Collectors, Debtor Claims

The Jakarta Globe

Ulma Haryanto, Zaky Pawas & Elisabeth Oktofani

Car dealer Muji Harjo said that there came a time when he could not pay the Rp 12 million ($1,400) bill on his credit card, issued by an international private bank.


When the deadline was up in October 2009, Muji was still unable to pay, so he handed over his 2005 Yamaha Vega motorcycle as collateral. In May, a debt collector rang Muji up and that’s when the real problems started.

“They asked me to meet them, so I did. There were two of them. I told them that I would have the money next month and that had I already given my motorcycle as collateral, Muji said on Friday.

“They responded with something rude. When I asked them what they mean by that, they beat me up.” Muji said the bones around his left eye were fractured in the attack. “I wore glasses at that time. I was lucky I didn’t go blind because the [lens] broke.”

Muji was taken to Boromeus Hospital in Bandung, West Java, where he his injuries were noted in a police report. He was hospitalized for three days and wound up spending Rp 70 million on surgery.

“My facial bones had to be reconstructed,” Muji said. “I had two witnesses who backed up my statement … However, until now the police have not been able to arrest anyone,” he said.

“Since there was no settlement offer from the bank, last month I filed my case at Bandung District Court,” he said. Under certain circumstances outsourced debt collectors are legal, according to a 2009 circular from Bank Indonesia.

David Tobing, Muji’s legal advisor, said the circular stipulated that debt collection should not be carried out in violation of the law. Tulus Abadi, chairman of the Indonesian Customer Protection Foundation (YLKI), said a lack of internal monitoring in the banking industry and weak customer protection made the debt collecting business appear to be above the law.

“They terrorize customers,” Tulus said.

The last time the YLKI opened an exclusive helpline for credit card services was in 2005. “Even at that time the top complaint was debt collectors. We had one female customer complaining that debt collectors sent faxes to her office several times a day, calling her a whore,” he said.

“When there are a lot of people who are unable to pay credit card bills, then they should assess and evaluate their card policy. Maybe they should be less aggressive in their promotions.”

Indonesian Govt Delays Film Tax Review Decision

The Jakarta Globe

If you have been waiting patiently for the past month, popcorn box in hand, to find out whether there will be any fresh Hollywood films to watch on the big screen anytime soon, you may have to keep on waiting.


The government on Wednesday failed to come out with a promised decision on the tax on imported films, saying negotiations hadn’t concluded yet.

Culture and Tourism Minister Jero Wacik, who had earlier promised that Wednesday would be the day he would reveal a decision on the tax issue that has led foreign film importers to stop bringing in new titles, said the scheme had yet to be finalized.

“We cannot announce the exact film tax scheme yet because it is still being discussed, taking into consideration three regulations, on customs, tax and also films,” Wacik said.

The policy in question led to members of the Motion Picture Association deciding to halt exports of films to Indonesia.

The core of the issue lies in the calculation of the customs value of imported films, which was previously based on the physical length of the film roll, with each meter valued at 43 cents. But the government now wants to tax royalties up front under a 2006 customs law that stipulates that royalties should be included in the import tax.

The government, though, has sent out mixed messages. While the Directorate General of Customs and Excise has appeared resolute about implementing the new royalty computation, the Culture and Tourism Ministry has maintained that the government was open to negotiations with film importers.

“I want to make sure that foreign films are still entering Indonesia,” Jero reiterated on Wednesday. He did not elaborate on the statement, instead announcing that a separate import tax on film production equipment would be scrapped to help give Indonesian film producers a boost.

The Tourism Ministry has previously said boosting the local film industry was the rationale behind the new royalty policy.
“President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono suggested developing the national film industry by reducing taxes for Indonesian filmmakers, so we are going to apply a zero percent tax on film production equipment,” Wacik said.

He said film production equipment and materials have always been listed as luxury items and therefore were slapped with high taxes.

“Other than that, we are going to reduce the value-added tax to a minimum level,” he said, without elaborating.
Wacik said the country’s current film production levels were not in a position to meet the demands of the 672 screening houses across the nation.

“That is why foreign films are needed, to meet the demand of the screens and also to become references for Indonesian filmmakers to improve the quality of their films,” Wacik said. “We do not want to create a policy that hurts many people, including Hollywood film fans and cinema employees.”

Wacik said the tax regime on imported films was aimed at protecting the national film industry while at the same time not harming foreign film imports.

“We just want to see foreign films enter Indonesia without violating the regulations. So far, the Directorate General of Taxation has decided on a tax scheme, but it has yet to finalize their decision,” he said.

In order to help increase public assess to films, Wacik said his ministry proposed to have dozens of film projection cars available in 2012 to cater to areas without cinemas.

“This idea is basically to bring films to all Indonesian citizens. In that way, films will be a form of entertainment not only enjoyed by city people but also by people from small towns or small villages.” Jero said.

Five Test Positive for Low Radiation

The Jakarta Globe

Low levels of radiation were detected on five Indonesians returning from Japan, but officials insist the levels are well within safe limits.


Reno Alamsyah, the director for alerts at the Nuclear Energy Regulatory Agency (Bapeten), said three of the five had returned on Saturday, while the other two flew in on an unspecified previous date.

“The last three Indonesian citizens, who just returned from Japan, registered 50 becquerels of radiation,” he told the Jakarta Globe.

“That was higher than the previous two, who registered at 20 becquerels. Actually, 50 becquerels isn’t a dangerous level for human health. It was just external radiation on their clothes and shoes that could be gotten rid of very easily.”

Reno said the group of three, who returned through Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta International Airport, had been living in Fukushima prefecture at the time the March 11 earthquake and tsunami triggered radiation leaks from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

He added that they were evacuated to the Indonesian Embassy in Tokyo soon after.

“The three of them were interns in Japan who were just a week into their internship in Fukushima,” Reno said.

“Soon after the tsunami hit, they were evacuated away from the nuclear power plant. Because they were in Fukushima, though, we were worried that they might have suffered some internal radiation that would have been undetectable at the airport,” he went on to say.

“Therefore, through the Health Ministry, we suggested they be brought to the Batan [National Nuclear Energy Agency] office for further tests.”

Susilo Widodo, head of safety technology and radiation metrology at Batan, said low levels of iodine-131 radiation had been detected on the three Indonesians.

“Iodine-131 isn’t a dangerous radioactive material,” he said.

“It has a half-life of eight days, which means it’ll lose its radioactivity in a short period of time. It would be a very different case if they had Cesium-137. That has a half-life of 30 years, which means it will stay active for a long time.”

The danger to humans depended on the half-life and the body organs affected, he added.

Reno said efforts to check passengers from Japan for radiation at Soekarno-Hatta and Bali’s Ngurah Rai International Airport would end shortly .

“With no more Indonesian citizens retuning from Japan, the radiation checks at both airports will cease by Friday,” he said.

Indonesia Still Waiting to Hear Final Decision on Foreign Film Tax

The Jakarta Globe

Despite previously promising to announce the final foreign film tax on National Film Day today, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism has postponed its announcement because the government institutions involved are yet to reach a conclusion on the matter.


Tourism Minister Jero Wacik said the ministry, Finance Ministry and Directorate General of Taxation were still finalizing the regulation on foreign films.

“We cannot announce the exact film tax scheme yet because it is still being discussed,” Jero said.

“The regulation is aimed at protecting the national film industry without harming foreign film imports. We just want foreign films to enter Indonesia without violating the regulation. So far the Directorate General of Taxation has decided on a tax scheme, but is yet to finalize their decision.”

The customs value of imported films was previously based on the physical length of the film roll, with each meter valued at 43 cents. The government now wants to tax royalties up front under a 2006 customs law that stipulates that royalties should be included in the import tax.

The new tax calculation is behind a recent move by the Motion Picture Association to halt the export of films to Indonesia.

Students Grow Rice in the Middle of Jakarta

The Jakarta Globe

While the government has been suggesting the nation find alternatives to a dwindling supply of locally grown rice, one teacher in Jakarta is promoting a program to grow the staple food in the middle of the city.


Suhri, an Indonesian language teacher at State Junior High School (SMPN) 209 in Kramat Jati, East Jakarta, has introduced a “Rice in a Bucket” cultivation program at his school as a way of teaching students about agriculture and self-sufficiency.

Despite not having a formal background in farming, he said a chance encounter at the rice-cultivating village he grew up in planted a seed that would grow into his innovative program.

“In 2007, my cousin in Ciamis district, in West Java, told me that anybody could plant rice nowadays without having to go out into the fields and get their suits and ties dirty,” he said.

“So I tried to get all the information I could and implemented the methods myself.”

Suhri said he tested the idea of planting rice in buckets at his house before eventually bringing the program to his school in 2007, starting with 50 buckets shared among the students.

“I didn’t want to propose the idea to the principal before I tried it myself. After I successfully harvested the organic rice from my own tiny rice field, then I took the idea to school,” he said.

“Fortunately, I got a positive response from the principal and we started the planting program in 2007.”

Suhri, who is also the coordinator of the school’s forestry program, said his students were excited to learn about growing rice in the city.

Yoga Setiawan, a ninth-grade student who has been taking part in the program, said growing rice in buckets was an innovative idea that he wanted to develop further once he finished school.

“Planting rice is actually not that difficult once you know how to do it,” he said.

Yoga said students bought their seeds at the local bird market and created the correct soil composition themselves.

“The first thing that we do is mix 60 percent soil and 40 percent compost. Then we let it sit for two to four weeks,” he said.

During those weeks waiting for the soil to set, the students prepare their rice plants by growing the sprouts that will be planted in the buckets.

Yoga said that although they never ate the rice they grew in the buckets, he and the other students were always excited when it came time to harvest.

“It takes us three and a half months to go from the preparation stage to harvest,” he said.

Suhri said that since 2007, students at the school had experimented with planting different types of rice to determine which variety was the best for the “Rice in a Bucket” project.

“We tried to plant Japanese rice in 2008, Situ Bagendit rice in 2009 and Ciherang rice in 2010,” he said. “Although Japanese rice tested better, the Japanese rice plant is the hardest to take care of because it is very tall.”

Suhri said the key to growing healthy rice plants with lots of stalks was to use organic liquid fertilizer — the best being your own urine.

“Before we began using urine as the extra organic fertilizer, each bucket only had 50 stalks of rice that produced one or two ounces of grain,” he said. “But since we’ve been using urine, each bucket produces 80 stalks of rice that can produce two to three ounces of grain.”

In order to reduce the smell from the urine, the students add grated ginger, galangal and turmeric mixed with water.

Ambar Susilowati, another ninth-grader involved in the program, said that aside from the fun of growing your own rice, the students also learned a lot about farming and rice cultivation.

“We’ve learned to appreciate farmers because they do so much hard work to grow the rice that ends up on the tables of so many Indonesians,” she said.

“That is why I always finish my food when I have breakfast, lunch and dinner.”

Ambar, who will graduate in the middle of this year, added that she wanted to introduce the method to as many people as possible so they could grow their own rice at home.

“I hope this knowledge will not be left at this school once we graduate, but will be spread around the city and help make Jakarta a little greener with small rice buckets in every home,” she said.

Trade Official Denies Govt Turning Blind Eye to Illegally Imported Fish

The Jakarta Globe
Trade Official Denies Govt Turning Blind Eye to Illegally Imported Fish

An advocate for local fishing communities claims the government is ignoring a 2010 law on imported fishery products by failing to destroy shipments of illegally imported fish.

Despite an official denial, Riza Damanik, secretary general for the Fisheries Justice Coalition (Kiara), said on Sunday that while the law clearly stated illegally imported fish must be returned to its country of origin within three days or incinerated, the government had failed to do so.

“There are 5,300 tons of illegally imported fish stuck in four ports and one airport, including Tanjung Priok Port, Belawan Port [in Medan, North Sumatra] and Soekarno-Hatta International Airport,” he said. “They’ve been there for a week now. They have not been returned to their country of origin or incinerated.”

Riza said that allowing such fish to be sold in the domestic market posed threats both to local fishermen’s welfare and to consumers’ health in general.

“These illegally imported fish are usually sold for cheaper than local fish. They’re also more widely available across Indonesia.

“If the government continues being inconsistent about enforcing its own law and letting illegal fish be sold in the Indonesian market without any controls, it will be dangerous for public health because there are no institutions to guarantee whether the fish are fit for consumption or not.”

However, Saut Hutagalung, director of international trade at the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry, denied that the government was not complying with the return-or-incinerate order.

“We need to keep in mind that imported items are also liable to customs regulations, which in the case of rejected items allow the importer a month to return the items — in this case the fish — to the country of origin,” he said.

“We’re coordinating with customs officials on a time frame to return the fish.”

Saut said the ministry had since March 19 seized more than 180 containers of fish at Belawan, Tanjung Priok and Tanjung Perak Port, in Surabaya, believed to have been illegally imported from China and Pakistan.

“Three containers have already been returned,” he said.

“The reason it’s taking so long to return the rest of them is because the importers have to fill out the requisite paperwork. They also have to wait for a spot in the shipping schedule.”

On Tuesday, Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Minister Fadel Muhammad said the government would blacklist Chinese companies illegally importing fish to the detriment of local fishermen.

Fadel said he had found “suspicious indications” involving 13 fish importing companies “owned by three or four people,” but declined to give any names.

With Nothing More to Do, Indonesian SAR Team Comes Back From Japan

The Jakarta Globe
With Nothing More to Do, Indonesian SAR Team Comes Back From Japan

A team from Indonesia arrived back in the country on Sunday after aiding search-and-rescue efforts for Indonesian citizens in Japan following the massive earthquake and tsunami there earlier this month.

Fatchul Hadi, secretary of the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB), said the 15-person team had initially been scheduled to remain in Japan for two weeks but had not been there as long as expected.

“Because there was nothing more they could do there, especially with regard to evacuation efforts, the government decided it would be best to send them back home,” he said.

Team leader M. Shokir said he and the other volunteers helped rescue 45 people in four separate locations in Ishinomaki city in Miyagi prefecture, one of the areas worst-hit by the tsunami.

“Our main objective was to find Indonesian citizens,” he said. “During our time there, we managed to locate 44 Indonesians and one Japanese citizen, whom we found dead.” Despite their efforts, he added, there were around 230 Indonesians still listed as missing in the disaster, many of them in the Ayukawa whaling town in Ishinomaki.

Shokir said the main difficulty his team encountered in their job was the wintery weather.

“The only problem we had was dealing with the sub-zero temperatures,” he said.

“Other than that, everything was fine. We’d prepared well before going to Japan, so we had sufficient drinking water and fuel.”

Despite their preparations, Shokir said the rescuers were constantly worried about the threat of nuclear radiation from the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Fukushima prefecture, south of Miyagi.

“However, we had a to-do-list in the event of a radiation threat, and we were working far enough from the Fukushima nuclear station,” he said.

Kojiro Shiojiri, the Japanese ambassador to Indonesia, who was also on hand to welcome the Indonesian team, expressed his gratitude to the government for willing to help Japan during the emergency situation.

In addition to the search-and-rescue team, the Indonesian government also donated $2 million and 10,000 blankets for the tsunami survivors.

“We want to thank you for the Indonesian search-and-rescue team, for their hard work and also their willingness to put themselves at risk and leave their families behind to help Japan,” Shiojiri said.

“We have also learned so many things from Indonesia, which has been able to [recover from] the Aceh tsunami in 2004.”

The ambassador added his government’s main objective now was to find the 30,000 people still missing and help the survivors return to normal life.

“It will take some time,” Shiojiri said.