Agnes Winarti, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Jakarta administration will continue working with neighboring areas West Java and Banten to deal with floods.

"We don't want to make the ecological crisis mitigation a mere topic of discussion or rhetorical statement," Jakarta Deputy Governor Prijanto said Monday at the opening ceremony of the city environmental management agency (BPLHD) workshop on ecological crises in Jakarta, Tangerang in Banten, as well as Bogor, Depok, Bekasi and Cianjur in West Java.

Given that the ecological crisis around Java, especially Jakarta's three neighboring provinces, is in a critical condition, Prijanto said it was deplorable there had not been any concrete action, following-up previous discussions.

"The discussion materials (about ecological crisis mitigation) could be stacked up to the moon, but where are the results?"

One of the speakers at the workshop, Chay Asdak, a forest hydrologist from the University of Padjajaran in Bandung, said neighboring provinces must change their attitude and sentiment toward Jakarta, which is regarded as the ultimate place where money and power are centered.

"There is a kind of psychological sentiment from other administrations that Jakarta deserves to experience this crisis because of its own destructive policies," Chay said, referring to the reluctance of other administrations to respond when Jakarta cried for help with ecological disasters.

The workshop's keynote speaker, National Development Planning Board official Herman Haeruman, said Jakarta and its neighboring provinces needed to learn to collaborate with all stakeholders, not just administration officials, but also with experts and the general public.

About 43 percent of Jakarta, which has two large rivers, the Cisadane and the Ciliwung (as well as 14 smaller ones), is between one and 1.5 meters beneath sea level.

The 2002 and 2007 floods in Jakarta were estimated to cause losses amounting to between Rp 7 and 10 trillion.

It was reported in February last year that Vice President Jusuf Kalla promised to provide more money from the central government for Jakarta and West Java to prepare for floods.

The previous Jakarta administration under Sutiyoso received the lion's share of the funds, with Rp 2.7 trillion (US$300 million) earmarked for the construction of the East and West Flood Canals, while the West Java provincial administration received Rp 250 million to improve rivers and 150 lakes in the province.

Herman said neither the provincial nor the state's annual budget would be enough to finance Jakarta's ecological crisis mitigation. Therefore, he said, the involvement of private investors was essential.

Triarko Nurlambang, an expert on geography at the University of Indonesia emphasized that the administration could not work alone.