Over half of Indonesia’s 235 million people are poor. Most struggle to survive on less than US$2 a day and about 18 per cent live on US$1 or less.

In the 1970’s Indonesia experienced economic growth accompanied by progressive social development. Then during the South-Eastern Asia crisis 1997/98 the Indonesian economy came close to collapse. Before the crisis, 16.8 per cent of the country’s families were officially classified as poor. At the height of the financial upheaval, the proportion of poor households in the country doubled. Using the $1-a-day measure, it is estimated that more than 80m Indonesians are in poverty.

Although Urban areas were hit the hardest they also recover the quickest, Millions of small farmers, farm workers and fishers are materially and financially unable to tap into the opportunities offered by years of economic growth. Approximately 60 per cent of the population live in rural areas where agriculture is the main source of livelihood.

Most of my time through Indonesia was to urban centres in Java - Jakarta and Bandung mostly… so here are a few photos to remind us how grateful we should be even be able to read blogs, because the people in these photos are just grateful to make it through the day. Today is blog action day, so share this post and give generously :-D

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