Indonesia's poverty rate falls-stats bureau

from Reuters

JAKARTA - Indonesia's poverty rate, among Asia's worst, fell to 15.42 percent in March from 16.58 percent in the same period a year ago, helped by higher wages and falling unemployment, the statistics bureau said on Tuesday.

The figure was calculated before the government raised fuel prices by about 29 percent in May and analysts said the poverty level was likely to increase after the impact of the hike kicks in.

The bureau said the number of poor people in the country of around 226 million fell to 34.96 million as of March this year from 37.17 million in March 2007.

The government defines people earning less than 182,636 rupiah ($19.81) a month as below the poverty line.

The bureau said the fall in poverty levels was partly due to an increase in the daily wage of labourers working in the agricultural sector.

Poverty levels came down as the unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent in February from 9.1 percent in August 2007 as many in the labour force were absorbed in informal jobs, the bureau said.

However, poverty remains a huge challenge for Indonesia, partly as the country still has a high unemployment rate, due to little growth in agriculture and manufacturing, which together employ about half the total labour force in the country.

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