Meeting the needs of older persons in Indonesia

Meeting the needs of older persons in Indonesia

Funding provided by the Australian Research Council and the ARC Centre of Excellence in Population Ageing Research.

This research is lead at ANU by Dr Iwu Utomo, in collaboration with the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, the Melbourne University School of Geography, the University of Indonesia, and UIN Jakarta.

The project examines the needs of older people in rural Indonesia for income, housing, health care, assistance with daily tasks and social interaction. It measures their needs, the extent to which their needs are met and how the needs are met. It also considers the efficacy of existing policy programs and how policy might be improved.

Survey work has been completed in 10 village settings spread across Indonesia. The villages were carefully chosen to represent communities where large numbers of the children of the older people have migrated out of the village. Our focus is upon how the needs of older people are met when the traditional system of family support is put under pressure because of out-migration of children. The chosen villages cover a range of ethnic groups and varying religious contexts. In each village, all people aged 60 and over are interviewed including proxy interviews for those unable to answer the questionnaire themselves. The data collection consists of around 3,000 detailed quantitative responses and around 160 in-depth interviews with older people, village officials and service providers and higher level policy makers. Early results from the study have been presented to policy makers through the Indonesian National Planning Board.

 

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