The 27th Foreign Correspondent Report

Women and Community Development through Posyandu(Pos Pelayanan Terpadu)
Ms. Astri HIDAYATI (Indonesia)
Indonesia is one of the biggest countries in the world with quite a high fertility rate, buton the other hand, the issue of babies’ and toddlers’ health is also becoming a growing concern
due to some cases of malnutrition. Such cases happen especially in congested areas where
government officers cannot easily reach out.
Traditionally, Indonesian society is based on so-called “gotong royong” or working
together in communities. Men and women are thriving together to make their neighbourhoodsa good place for them to live side by side. One of the measures that the neighbourhoods havebeen conducting is a childcare activity. This activity is called Posyandu (Pos PelayananTerpadu) that can be translated as Integrated Health Service which is aimed to take care thehealth of babies and toddlers, and expectant mothers. Posyandu is most of the time led by
women in the neighbourhoods, each consisting of 50 houses or more. Local governments supply
them with healthy foods for kids and also send health officers to examine the welfare of kids
and expectant mothers.
Posyandu is conducted not only in the congested areas, but also in the middle-class areas.
The activities are held once a month, providing services such as weighing kids (up to 5-yearolds), keeping the records of the kids’ weight, height and what kind of conditions they are in.
The officers from the health service help Posyandu by giving vaccines or health check-ups forthe kids. During the Posyandu time, there is health consultation as well. The local
governments are always involved in such activities to ensure that the community services arealways available and well-documented for future development.
The fact that women always take part in the community service is like a sign on how thewomen’s roles in the society are always important. Regarding health awareness, usually the
women take more active roles in the society. And Posyandu has existed in Indonesia for morethan 30 years. Besides it’s a place for health-related activities, it’s also a place where theneighbourhoods gather and also discuss many/various issues related to their neighbourhoods.
On many levels, women’s involvement in community development is prominentlyadmitted. Indonesia has a political rule that 30% of the parliament seats must be allocated forwomen. Such a regulation is like an acknowledgment of women’s participation in thedevelopment, either on a neighbourhood level or a national level.
It is safe to say that women’s empowerment in Indonesia is obviously seen even on aneighbourhood level. Posyandu is basically a way to provide better livelihoods for the kids(babies and toddlers) and also their parents. Women’s empowerment is not merely about
politics or high-level policy-making. There is a saying that women are the backbone of thesociety; therefore, their activities also determine what kind of society we live in when thewomen has their own empowerment activity in the neighbourhood.
To some extent, we can say that in a small-scale neighbourhood where people usuallyknow each other, people might feel more comfortable to be around those whom they know, andthat is why such program like Posyandu is conducted everywhere in all over Indonesia. Of
course Posyandu is not only for women but also for men to take the burden. In this sense, themen’s involvement is usually related to infrastructure preparation while women are most
likely to take over the action of service on the designated day.

The 27th Foreign Correspondent Report
The local governments also have to actively play a role in the empowerment of women. In
such an activity as Posyandu, the involvement of the local government is so imminent because
it is also determined by facts such as how the health monitoring and evaluation need the helpof the society in the neighbourhood. Posyandu could be used as a monitoring time to see thehealth’s quality of the kids in the neighbourhood. Women will always play an important rolein the community development due to the nature of most neighbourhood in Indonesia that is
usually relied on the women’s activities. Women are leaders in many aspects. They could
empower themselves because they are well prepared to do it. Posyandu is an example of manythings done by women in community development.

A kid is being weighed in a monthly checking.