The ministry’s deputy for family planning and reproductive health, Wahidin, informed here on Monday that women make up 97 percent of contraceptive users, while only 3 percent are men.
Awareness of birth control has also been largely shouldered by women, he said. In addition, most contraceptives available are still intended for women.
“The types of contraceptives for men are still limited; there are not many choices,” he expounded.
To this end, he expressed the hope that, going forward, there will be innovations in contraceptives that target men.
The Ministry of Population and Family Development is planning to propose a larger budget allocation for the procurement of contraceptives for 2026.
The ministry’s secretary, Budi Setiyono, said that for the 2025 procurement, the budget for contraceptives was just Rp200 billion (approximately US$12.3 million) due to the government’s budget efficiency policy.
Meanwhile, the previous year, the budget allocation stood at Rp850 billion (approximately US$52.3 million).
Thus, the ministry is hoping that the budget for 2026 would at least be the same as 2024.
Setiyono said that given the threat of an imbalance in the population structure, his ministry needs to find prompt and alternative solutions to control the population, which is currently continuing to increase.
He informed that the ministry is making efforts to encourage families to buy contraceptives independently to help control the national population.
According to data from Statistics Indonesia (BPS), 56.26 percent of married women in Indonesia were using contraceptives in 2024.
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Translator: Azmi Syamsul, Raka Adji
Editor: Arie Novarina
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