Indonesia

Tsunami Areas Project

Snapshot of Success KBQB Farmer Cooperative KBQB has shown a profit since its first year, and has already resulted in the creation of more than 800 new jobs for people who were displaced by the tsunami and whose farmlands were damaged during the civil war. As of March 2008, more than 2,700,000 improved coffee seedlings have been distributed to farm plots belonging to 2,317 farmers.

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The world's largest archipelagic state, Indonesia has a population of over 245.5 million that is growing at a rate of 1.41% ('06 est.) The nation is struggling to rebuild after the devastating effects of the December 2004 tsumani and May 2006 central Java earthquake. GDP is estimated at $264.4 billion, with growth at 5.4% per year. Per capita GDP is $3,800 (2006 est.). While 17.8% of the population live below the poverty line (2006), adult literacy is 87.9%. The country's main agricultural products are rice, cassava (tapioca), peanuts, rubber, cocoa, coffee, palm oil, copra, poultry, beef, pork, and eggs. Yearly exports are valued at $102.3 billion (freight on board, 2006 est.).

History
Continuing program activities in Indonesia since 1977.

Current Project
Tsunami Areas Project, or Enterprise Development and Employment-Generation Project for the Tsunami Impacted Areas of Sumatra Development Project - TAP (October 2005 - September 2008)

Funding
United States Agency for International Development (USAID)

Goal
Stimulate sustainable improvements in the economic well-being of, those individuals, families and groups in Sumatra that were most directly affected by the impact of the December 2004 tsunami as well as the civil conflict that erupted in many of the project's target areas over the four years prior to the peace agreement signed between the parties in conflict on 15th August 2005.

Objectives
(1) Accelerate economic renewal by expanding employment and income-generating opportunities through strengthening the business capacities of rural enterprises (existing or newly created) to enable them to increase the scope, volume and value of their economic activities.
(2) Address the immediate, short-term and medium-term financial needs of small-scale entrepreneurs, agricultural cooperatives, credit and savings cooperative and individual farm families in the target areas to enable them to play a productive role in rebuilding and reestablishing the area's economy.
(3) Address specific long-term economic problems related to the impact of the tsunami and economic issues that have contributed to the civil unrest present in the area over the past two decades.

Strategies
NCBA's strategy is to put in place sustainable business activities that serve both the current and long-term employment and income-generating needs of the target population.

The project is focusing on three target areas:

• Central highland communities of Aceh - re-establish both sustainable enterprises and employment opportunities with a focus on the re-establishment and marketing of quality coffee, which is the principal cash crop of the region; rehabilitation of coffee producing areas that were destroyed during the conflict years; support to the development of a financial banking system designed on a cooperative basis.
• Provincial Capital of Banda Aceh - support to micro-finance cooperatives for women particularly focused on small scale enterprise establishment to generate much needed family livelihoods and income.
• Southeast Coast Region - rehabilitation of particularly devastated to reestablish basic crops and revitalize enterprises based on those crops, especially "Nilam" the leaves of which is distilled a highly valued aromatic oil - Patchouli. The Project has established a Patchouli nursery at Teunom in the District of Aceh Jaya, and is in the process of completing a distillation facility for oil production where a supporting project has been designed for the patchouli farmers' cooperative.

Impact (as of March 2008)

Agricultural Development Operations

• The membership of Koperasi Baitul Qiradh Baburrayyan 6,642 farmers cultivating 7,927 ha spread over 19 sub-districts and organized into 131 farmer groups.
• Many of the displaced people of the Gayo ethnicity, who moved back to their homeland after the tsunami destroyed their businesses and decimated their families, have been able to restart agricultural operations on their old land. These people fled their farms five years ago, at the beginning of the long and violent civil conflict in Aceh.
• All of the current farmer-members have successfully passed organic inspections by programs of the USDA, the EU and Japan.
• The cooperative has obtained international Fair Trade certification, and KBQB's farms have been approved by the Starbucks Coffee Company.
• $2.32 million of organic coffee sales had already taken place in the first quarter of 2008 ending in March, and sales were expected to quadruple during the harvest season, between April and June.

Microfinance Operations

• The number of women's cooperatives focused on micro-finance increased to 28 active coops with an overall membership of 2,209
• 477 new loans were issued in the first quarter of 2008 and the total repayment rate has been an impressive 99.7%