Nearly half of Indonesia's 220 million people live on less than $2 a day despite government strides in tackling poverty, the World Bank said on Thursday.
Poverty levels, which had increased by over one-third during the 1997/98 Asian financial crisis, were now back to pre-crisis levels, meaning about 42 percent of the population was surviving on between $1 to $2 a day, a bank report said. More people are also at risk, since many households are clustered around the national income poverty line of $1.55-a-day, it added.
"One of the most important features of poverty (in Indonesia) is the vulnerability of those who are just above the poverty line," Andrew Steer, World Bank Indonesia country director, told reporters after unveiling the report.
About 40 percent of those considered poor cannot afford to send their children to secondary school, perpetuating the problem from one generation to the next, he added.
"The secret to reducing poverty is to help these people participate in Indonesia's rising growth," Steer said. "At present the poor have less access to the assets that enable them to participate." Indonesia's vast geographic spread also creates wide regional disparities in income and poverty levels, which are becoming particularly stark, the bank said.
A tiny number of Indonesians are among the richest people in Asia while millions live in dire poverty in urban slums or shanty towns in the countryside. The World Bank said revitalising agriculture by improving rural roads and providing micro-loans would help reduce the swelling ranks of the poor.
It also urged the government to remove a ban on rice imports. A 33 percent increase in the rice price between February 2005 and March 2006 alone put an additional 3 million people into poverty, the report said.
Welfare Minister Aburizal Bakrie, speaking at the same press conference, said the government had allocated 51 trillion rupiah ($5.6 billion) for poverty reduction programmes for 2007. "Our short-term challenge is to achieve the target of reducing the poverty rate to 8.5 percent in 2009," said Bakrie.