8. REVITALISE SVD COMMITMENT FOR ECO-PASTORAL APPROACH IN FLORES

PUBLIC LECTURES FOR NORWEGIAN STUDENTS UNIVERSITY OF AGDER IN LEDALERO, (MONDAY, JANUARY 17TH, 2011)

ON ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT (POVERTY REDUCTION)

Some Efforts to Revitalize SVD Commitment for Eco and Agricultural Pastoral Approach in Flores

(By Fr. Anselm Meo SVD)

First of all I want to thanks all the speakers before me, because from their lectures, we got a sound foundation for our session. Fr. Ansel Dore Dae SVD for examples gave us a historical background on the SVD involvement on Economic Development in this island, and Fr. Robert Mirsell SVD, stressed on the government role on the same area. So, for this session I am trying to focus only on some small efforts but real in poverty reduction issue.

SVD Pastoral Approaches for Economic Development in the Past – “Option for the People”

In my view, there have been so many programs run by the Church on economic development for the people of Flores especially since the mission of SVD in Nusa Tenggara in 1913. Some of those programs were excellence and SVD fathers were awarded “NTT rings of Development/Cincin Pembangunan NTT” by the local government of East Nusa Tenggara as pioneers on development of the people.

There were some strong steps which they combined for the success of their program that time, such as: a) clear vision and option for the people, (b) work together with government and other organization to provide funds for their project, (c) implementing the power of science and technology through training and formal and vocational schools for people.

These three points always mention about people, in fact this is the key for poverty reduction. Rev. Mgr. Hubertus Hermens Makumaja, SVD, my former parish priest in Laja said about the irrigation of ZaA in Ngada District as follows, “For Zaa project, I have a clear vision, I used money out of government pockets, I embrace the use of technology and the willingness of the people to help themselves getting out of poverty”.

Revitalize the Option for the People in Eco-Agriculture Pastoral Approach

I mentioned this great personality like Fr. Hubertus Hermens SVD to underline that the choice I made on implementing the Eco - Pastoral especially Agriculture Pastoral approach is not a new choice for doing pastoral in Flores context but we are indeed trying to revitalize the choice of SVD fathers in the last two decades.

What can we do now?

Working for poverty reduction, we know that we cannot do it alone and we cannot do everything. We have so many people and organizations, government officers, who have this option to poverty reduction. But what we can do, it is our commitment to offer for the people of Flores and to my view it is about revitalize the option of SVD in the past to help people to provide healthy food for themselves, to provide money for the education for their children. These two aspects can be created through a system such as “integrated and sustainable agriculture activities”.

This system need to be carefully planned, because it is costly but can be done in a SVD way. I called it “SVD way” because it was the way well planned and structured in the past by SVD Fathers and Brothers, but the church pastoral agents have destructed them systematically in the name of pastoral strategies of the local church nowadays.

How to To do it?

Here are some small steps to be taken:

1) Providing opportunities for young people for training skill or formal education in agriculture activities and all its sub units:

To enforce this concept, since May 2010, I started the program for the youth, called Taman Tani Lestari Sesawi Flores (Sesawi Flores Sustainable and Integrated Farming), which is intended to:

(a) Prepare a training program for the farmers in order to increase their skills in farming and to improve or increase their agricultural products.

(b) Social-economic service through education and training to the development of the source of human capacity.

(c) Offer training programs for the skills in the field of agriculture, animal husbandry and fishpond development for the out of school youths (those who cannot attain to a higher education), in cooperation with the alumni Agricultural Course Taman Tani Salatiga, Jawa Tengah and alumni Course of Organic Agriculture Foundation Karang Widya, Bogor, Jawa Barat, and Permakultur in Bali.

2) The involvement and commitment of credit institutions such as banks, Credit Union, etc., to provide business capital aid or funding for the people (especially poor people) in micro scale. SVD (Fr. Ben Baack SVD) has successfully installed CU in Flores and trained the people of Flores through education to increase their saving through Credit Union.

3) The use of applied-technology which easily implemented by the local people, using the local resource. Therefore we need an institution like ATMI Semarang to be present here in Flores, and vocational schools in agriculture and its sub units. For this purpose, SVD has to work with the laity as partner not as those who work for us but badly paid their salary.

4) Providing markets and its networking for the people – this will reinforce the business, providing access to the market and improving the business management.

Copyright @ Ledalero, January 17^th, 2011, by Fr. Anselmus Meo SVD