Community-based green areas needed, say NGOs

Evi Mariani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

In response to the administration's plan to evict thousands of residents in 2008 to make way for green areas, organizations have offered a community-based approach in revitalizing green areas.

The organizations said they believed that the concept would benefit the city, the communities and the public.

"The city could save some budget money for revitalization and maintenance, while it would still get the green areas," Nurkholis Hidaya from Jakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH) told a press conference Wednesday.

Nurkholis said that in the draft of the city budget, the institute noted that during 2008 the city planned to evict 16 communities to get 55,540 square meters of green areas. The fund for the evictions and revitalization is set at Rp 27.3 billion.

The series of evictions is another phase in the administration's plan to increase the city's existing green area, 9.6 percent of its total 9,156 hectares, to 13.9 percent by 2010.

Among the 16 communities to be moved are the fish and flower traders on Jl. Barito, who were evicted on Jan. 18. The next community to be evicted is ceramics and rattan traders in Rawasari, Central Jakarta.

Vendors in Rawasari got their eviction orders on Wednesday.

LBH Jakarta and the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi), which helped Barito fish and flower sellers protest against the move, said communities in Jakarta were smart. They had the capacity to offer solutions to the city's problems, if the city administration allowed them, the groups said.

"We work with at least two architecture firms, which support community-based design. For Barito, the YP+A firm had designed a lively hybrid park," Nurkholis said.

He said it was unfortunate the administration had decided to its own design, despite praising the one proposed by the vendors.

Selamet Daroyni from Walhi said the city's plan to evict thousands was unfair and showed the city did not have the courage to shut down the malls and hotels sitting on formerly green areas and instead preferred to tackle the powerless.

"Jakarta's green areas have dwindled from 37.2 percent in 1965 to 6.2 percent in 2007, largely thanks to the developments of large commercial buildings like malls and hotels," Selamet said in the conference.

"The communities only use a small percentage the green areas, about 10 percent, probably," he added. "Therefore, we think the city's attempt to evict these communities won't touch the source of Jakarta's environmental problems."