T

he National Demography and Family Planning Agency (BKKBN) has organized a competition to select young Generasi Berencana (GenRe) ambassadors who will campaign for greater sexual and reproduction health awareness among their peer groups.

It is the third time the BKKBN has conducted the competition. The competition is ongoing and so far 64 university students from 32 provinces have registered their participation.

The young ambassadors will be expected to play a crucial role in the campaign because unhealthy sexual behavior among young people in Indonesia, especially those who are unmarried, continues to increase due to a lack of knowledge about sexual and reproductive health issues.

“If we do not give young people proper information about sexual and reproductive health, we will face consequences such as early marriage and unwanted pregnancies.

“This will affect our efforts to reduce the country’s population growth rates,” BKKBN chairman Sugiri Syarief told journalists on Monday.

According to the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), the population of Indonesian continues to increase by about 4 million per year.

The number of young people aged 10–24 years has now reached 64 million out of a total 237.6 million people in the country, which is regarded as high.

Unhealthy sexual behavior caused by poor awareness of sexual and reproductive health issues is one of the three most critical challenges that the country’s youth face today.

The other challenges are the soaring rates of HIV/AIDS infection and drug addiction.

Sugiri said the average age of marriage among Indonesians had tended to get younger year by year.

“This will limit opportunities of young Indonesians, women in particular, to pursue higher education or get better jobs for their future prosperity,” he said.

According to a 2007 Indonesian Demography and Health Survey (SDKI), the average age of marriage for Indonesian women was 19.8 years old.

Research jointly conducted by the Australian National University (ANU) and the University of Indonesia (UI)’s Health Research Center in 2010 showed that 20.9 percent of young women were pregnant and gave birth before getting married.

Meanwhile, 38.7 percent of young women who became pregnant out of wedlock got married before giving birth.

“This shows that the proportion of young people who get married early due to unwanted pregnancy is relatively high,” said Sugiri, referring to the research that involved 3,006 respondents aged from 17 to 24 in three cities; Bekasi, Jakarta and Tangerang.

The BKKBN is hoping to increase the median age of first marriage to 22 years for women and 25 years
for men.

“I hope the selected GenRe ambassadors will take part in campaigning for a proper age for marriage and how to avoid the biggest challenges young people face today: unhealthy sexual behavior, HIV/AIDS and drugs,” said Sugiri.

The winners of the competition will be announced on May 11.

Bangka Belitung is the only province that is not taking part in this year’s contest.