Govt plans to increase education budget

Erwida Maulia and Aditya Suharmoko , The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Tue, 06/17/2008 10:05 AM | National

The government has proposed the education budget be increased from Rp 48 trillion (US$5.16 billion) this year to around Rp 51 trillion in 2009.

The Rp 3 trillion increase is due to increased funding for the teacher certification program, which is overseen by the directorate general for the improvement of teachers' and educators' quality, Education Minister Bambang Sudibyo said.

It is proposed the directorate general receive a further Rp 5 trillion on top of the approximately Rp 7 trillion it received this year.

"We need to prioritize the program because we have to pay the professional allowances for teachers who pass the certification, as mandated by the 2005 Law on Teachers and Lecturers," Bambang told a hearing at the House of Representatives' Commission X, which oversees education, sport and tourism, on Monday.

He said the professional allowances budget would inevitably rise every year, in step with the number of teachers targeted to pass certification.

The government has proposed budget cuts for most other areas of education, including the nine-year compulsory basic education program, which is facing a Rp 3 trillion cut to Rp 18 trillion, and higher education, which will be cut by Rp 1 trillion to about Rp 13 trillion.

"But the nine-year compulsory education program will still receive the largest share of the education budget," Bambang said.

Golkar Party lawmaker Tonny Aprilani told the minister to review the planned 2009 budget, saying an increase would be difficult to accommodate because the total state budget allocated for ministries and other state institutions would likely fall by nearly Rp 11 trillion to Rp 307 trillion in 2009.

Other House members asked the education minister not to cut the budgets, but rather increase them for programs such as compulsory basic education in underprivileged regions, internal ministry inspections, informal and early childhood education and science and technology research.

Funds allocated for education this year account for 11.2 percent of the total state budget.

Although the government plans to increase the education budget by only Rp 3 trillion, it said it was optimistic it would be able to comply with the Constitutional requirement to spend 20 percent of the state budget on education.

According to Nina Sardjuni, deputy chairman of the National Development Planning Agency (Bappenas), this will be made possible by including teachers' salaries in the education budget.

Teachers' salaries were previously included in civil servant expenditure. The Constitutional Court ruled earlier this year that teachers' salaries should be included in the education budget.

Nina said if the general allocation funds (DAU) disbursed to regions this year were included in the education budget, the budget would reach almost 18 percent of 2008 state expenditure even without the salaries.

The aim of the DAU is to support regions in achieving autonomy. Many regions use the funds to finance education, as regions also are obliged to allocate 20 percent of their budget to education.

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