Poverty in East Java and Indonesia

Poverty in East in Java and Indonesia
By: Jousairi Hasbullah

I do want to start our discussion with someting general, simple..very simple related to poverty. What I am going to say is that the efforts to reduce poverty must be accompanied by a good understanding of what povertuly means. If there is a gap between policies to reduce poverty and a correct understanding of the concept and measurements, it is very likely that the results will be different from what is expected.

Measuring poverty in Indonesia and applied to all provinces and district as well, the concept being used is monetary. Poverty is the lack of income in the form of money to maintain the basic level of household expenditure. As we know, out of 84 developing countries, according to the inventories of the United Nations Statistics Divisions, more than 50 percent countries are using the expenditure approach for consupmtion, 30 percent countries use the income approach, and the rest are combination of the two.

In determining whether someone is poor or not, what is used is the amount of money to purchase the food consisting the minimum amount of calories ( 2100 kcalories) per day plus the most basic of non-food needs. This amount of money is then used to set the poverty line. Below the line, the population is classified as poor. What is the result? I just want to give you the figures. It is of your challenges to give meaning to the figures below..a very simple example:
Poverty (%) East Java      Indonesia
1999                 29,47           23,40
2000                 22,77           19,14
2004                 20,08           16,70
2005                 19,95           15,97
2008                 18,51           15,40
2010                 15,26           13,30
2011                 14.23           12,49
2013 Mar        12,55           11,36
2016 Maret     12,05           10,86
2017 Maret     11,77           10 64
2019 Maret     10,37            9,41
2019Septmber10,20           9,22

Twenty years ago, the gap of the poverty rate between East Java and National figures was very wide of around 6 percent. But now the gap become narrower of only around 1 percent. It means the speed of poverty reduction in east Java better compared to national average.

Using these sets of data does not mean simply publishing the figures and then debating them. To use the data in meaningful way, one must understand the concept, definition, measurement method and characteristics in the data.

JSH
Ramadhan 14. 6 May 2020.
In the moment of stay at home. Covid19.