The Future of the Sukunan program
On the ground...
Educating adults and children about air, water and soil pollution is new to Indonesia. The Sukunan Program is a tangible, on-the-ground program that presents an excellent opportunity to spread ideas of sustainable environmental management. It has been attracting attention, newspaper articles, visitors, and hopefully imitators, from many parts of South East Asia.
Back in Sukunan, developers are beginning to buy up parts of the rice fields that buffer the village from the city. Unplanned and unregulated urban sprawl threatens to engulf Sukunan. And well-connected manufacturers continue to produce a tsunami of non-degradable packaging with which waste managers struggle to cope. Many battles loom ahead...
The earthquake that struck central Java on 27 May 2006 has temporarily shifted the focus of the program. Sukunan was close to the epicentre of the earthquake, and 196 houses were badly damaged or destroyed. House reconstruction is taking place with an emphasis on the use of recycled materials.
At the academic level...
Dr Lea Jellinek meanwhile has successfully won funding support from the Southeast Asia Node of the Australian Research Council Asia Pacific Futures Research Network (APFRN) for the second stage of this project, "Communicating Best Practice in Environmental Management to the Asia Pacific".
The project partners gratefully acknowledge the support of the the ARC -APFRN for their support.