Dear all,
Following is the idea behind and implication of South-South Cooperation (SSC)
between the Southern Province, Sri Lanka and Gorontalo Province, Indonesia
which is just launched.
As the outcome of discussion betwen two governors during 2nd international
convention in Morocco, Gorontalo Province and the Southern Province SL under
the initiative of South-South Cooperation affirmed their willingness to engage
in future cooperation in the sectors of agriculture, education and health as
well as local economic development. This taking place within the UNDP-Art Gold
Program. We just recieved a reciprocal visit of Sri Lankan delegation undertook
14-18 Dec. What is UNDP Art Gold and why SL? This question might be disturbing
our mind now.
Art Gold is an international cooperation initiative designed by a group of UN
Agencies (UNDP, UNESCO and others) to promote and create platform for local
actors where they could work towards regional development by achieving win-win
situationthe, mainly in achieving MDGs. The dynamic development within
Gorontalo province which is, among other, taking place under continously
developing interegional and interagencies networking has led province to the
1st pilot province of Art Gold Program in Indonesia.
Why SL? UNDP reports show SL is doing very well, mainly in health and education
sectors which also reflected in the final HDI rank of 99 as opposed to 107 of
Indonesia. Yes, these are just numbers but they do tell a story, especially for
a country experiencing a long lasting conflict in the North and East. SL, for
instance, is good at percentage of physicians GDP on health and births attended
by skilled health personal. While Indonesia is just allocating 20% of
development budget for education, SL has been enjoying more than 30% national
budget for free education.
Scaled down to provincial level, the two Provinces are also pursuing national
goals at sub national level. Gorontalo Province for instance, attempts to shift
the old style government to the new one including reform in public
administration, which for Gorontalo is of as its great priority. By adapting
the concept of NPM, the Province Government has been in identifying and
pursuing innovative advancements and consistently searching the best practices
in target areas of capacity building. Implementing entrepreneurial government,
Provincial Government of Gorontalo has shifted its focus and concentrating on
just three aspects of development including HRD, Agriculture and Marine and
Fisheries. Since its establishment, Gorontalo Province, for example, is still
doing a number improvement programs dealing with sectoral development mainly in
agriculture. Unsurprisingly, during the last three years, performance of
province economic growth has been the second
within Sulawesi Island . Nationally, we even ranked as the 2nd and the 8th
best province in terms of productivity and production respectively. Surely, we
still also have so many homeworks eg. poverty, unemployment, environmental
issues, ethical sharing in agriculture, etc..etc......
So, what is implications of and lesson learnts coming from the SSC initiative?
We may study strategies which lead Sri Lanka to achieve 90% its MDG targets
already five years before the deadline, particularly in health sector including
strengthening preventative and curative care system, health service network,
etc. In education we can adapt policy and strategy in fomulating incentives
include scholarships, mid-day meals, free textbooks; modernizing the primary
school curriculum; upgrading teacher training courses, formulating National
Action Plan for Children; etc..
For lesson learnts, needless to say, that in pursuing better performance in
human development, Sri Lanka neglecting infrastructures. Our visit to SL
indicated this. Old buildings, roads, etc found every where in the country.
However, inside the old offices, officials working seriously and no air
polution exhausted from those old buses. No long queue shown at the health
centers and hospital. A condition whcih is mostly found in our experience.
Referred to our workshops, said that Gorontalo province is better in promoting
innovative works. For instance, they admired our developed agricultural
managerial set up which is rarely found in SL. To sum up, if we put aside
hedonism and promote functional works rather than ceremonial ones I believe we
will be very much better in develoment compared to neighboring regions
(locally) or even countries (nationally). At local level, innovative works in
regional development are very much nedeed, of course without
compromising national framework.
I think this could be a change which is not only we can believe (as Obama
said) but also a change we can do.
Thanks,
Aryanto Hs.