As a vast archipelago comprising 17,024 islands, Indonesia faces unique challenges in managing water resources in these areas.
"Limited access to resources, minimal infrastructure, and vulnerability to disasters make water management in small islands a critical issue," stated the head of the National Water Resources Council Secretariat Yunitta Chandra Sari in a statement.
IWRM in small islands was a key topic addressed in the ministerial declaration issued by participating countries at the 10th World Water Forum (WWF) in Bali last May.
To support the IWRM approach, Sari said the Indonesian government has built supporting policy instruments for water resource management in small islands.
Indonesia adopted the principles of IWRM after the Dublin Declaration in 1992 in a project supported by the World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
The principles have also been adopted by the government through Law Number 7 of 2004 concerning Water Resources, which was updated to Law Number 17 of 2019.
"This law firmly mandates that water resource management can be managed in an integrated, sustainable, and comprehensive manner to maximize the prosperity of the people," Sari explained.
She then listed the five aspects of IWRM that Indonesia is focusing on — water resource conservation, water resource utilization, water damage control, community empowerment, and water resource information systems.
They further include being prepared for facing problems such as limited raw water availability, difficult water accessibility, and the erosion of the coastline.
Sari emphasized that more attention needs to be paid to the outermost small islands because these areas are at risk of facing a number of problems.
The problems include coastline erosion, which can result in the retreating of the country's borders, limited raw water availability, difficult water accessibility, as well as vulnerability to disasters.
According to Sari, the involvement of the central government, regional governments, the private sector, and the community is a determining factor for ensuring the integrated management of water resources in the outermost small islands.
"It is time for Indonesia, which is an archipelago country, to prioritize small and outermost islands as the front porch for defense and security," she added.
The Bali ministerial declaration released in May 2024 also proposed the establishment of World Lake Day to ensure the sustainability of lakes.
In the declaration, Indonesia and the countries that participated in the 10th World Water Forum also agreed to establish a center of excellence on water and climate resilience as a forum for developing capacity and knowledge to strengthen global water and sanitation management.
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Translator: Farhan Arda Nugraha, Yashinta Difa
Editor: Aditya Eko Sigit Wicaksono
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