T

he Jakarta administration says Thousand Islands regency has significantly improved over the past few years, despite reports that the regency was taken for granted despite its economic contribution.

Jakarta’s Assistant for People’s Welfare, Mara Oloan Siregar, told The Jakarta Post on Friday that, since Thousand Islands became a regency in 2006, “more and more electricity infrastructure and healthcare facilities have been provided”.

Thousand Islands was formerly a district of North Jakarta. It consists of 105 islets with a total land area of 8.7 square kilometers and a population of more than 20,000.

Mara said that the electricity project, which began in 2007, brought electricity to five of the southern islands. Another Rp 103 billion (US$11.7 million) will bring electricity to eight more islands in the regency.

Mara added that Jakarta had also established public health centers in each of the regency’s six sub-districts and one hospital in the regency capital of Pulau Panggang.

The Rujak Center for Urban Studies research group reported on Thursday that the regency administration received a small portion of Jakarta’s budget in return for its average annual contribution of Rp 130 billion to the city since 2004.

According to the center, the regency produced 2.87 million barrels of crude oil worth around Rp 1.86 trillion last year, but the city only allocated Rp 170.9 billion for the regency.

“The islands have more poor people than other regions,” said Dian Tri Irawaty, a Rujak Center member.

She said the prices of goods in the islands were more expensive than on the mainland because of the extra transportation fees.

They only get 10 hours of electricity per day and clean water is rare, obtained mostly through osmosis.

Dian said educational opportunities were also a huge problem because there was only one senior high school and one vocational school in the islands. (awd)

— JP/Andreas D. Arditya