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ewly installed Bali Governor Made Mangku Pastika declared that poverty alleviation was still the top priority in his second term.

'€œI will remain focused on how to eradicate poverty. I really hope that someday there will be no poverty on this island,'€ Pastika said.

Pastika dedicated most of his administration'€™s resources in his first term to launching and implementing a series of poverty alleviation programs, which included an expensive free healthcare service and Rp 1 billion (US$91,200) cash aid for any village with a high poverty rate.

Poverty alleviation was also a constant topic throughout his campaign for re-election early this year. His continuous attention toward this populist program cost Pastika dearly in last May'€™s election. Results showed that he lost the election in the island'€™s most urbanized regions, Denpasar in particular, and main tourism areas, such as Kuta and Ubud.

Tourism industry leaders had repeatedly implied that Pastika did not give sufficient attention to the needs of the island'€™s biggest moneymakers. The governor, however, did not change course and managed to secure his second term winning only 996 more votes than his contender.

Pastika admitted that poverty remained a major problem for the island.

'€œPoverty is not a simple thing that is easy to address. We need a strong commitment, attempt, and more time for that,'€ Pastika said.

The number of people living in poverty in Bali has been decreasing since 2008, when Pastika started his Bali Mandara initiative placing poverty alleviation as a top priority.

In 2008, the number of people living below the poverty line in the province amounted to 6.17 percent of the population. This dropped to 4.18 percent in 2009 and 3.9 percent in 2010. However, in 2011, the number of poor people had increased to 4.2 percent.

In 2012, the percentage had once again decreased to 3.95 percent, making Bali the province with the second lowest number of poor people in the nation, after Jakarta. This year, the administration is targeting reducing poverty to 3.28 percent of the population. Pastika is eager to decrease poverty to only 1 percent by 2018.

Among the Bali Mandara initiatives are the popular Jaminan Kesehatan Bali Mandara (JKBM), free healthcare for all registered residents of the island; Bedah Rumah, house renovation for homes owned by poor households; a scholarship program for poor students; an integrated farming system (Simantri), which offers cash and technical assistance to farmers'€™ groups willing to adopt organic farming and alternative energy sources; and the most recent, Gerbang Sadhu, Rp 1 billion in aid for any poor village ready to implement an economic acceleration program.

The word mandara is an acronym for mandiri (self-reliant), aman (safe), damai (peaceful) and sejahtera (prosperous).

Pastika hoped that the island'€™s high-income families would play an active role in eradicating poverty. '€œWe still have a huge number of people living in inadequate houses. If all high-income residents contributed to our house renovation program, it would speed up our attempt to address poverty,'€ Pastika said.