Tokyo. Advertising spending in Asian
economic powerhouses such as China will see double-digit growth in the
next few years, buoyed by firm consumer confidence and a growing middle
class, a top advertising executive said on Friday.

“We see
optimism and real increases, particularly in the big markets,” said Jim
Heekins, chairman and CEO of the Grey Group, a global advertising firm.

“Certainly
in India and China, 10 percent increases at least in advertising. We’ll
see that kind of healthy growth in most of the faster-growing economies
out here,” he told Reuters in a telephone interview.

One of the
keys to this is the region’s big population, with the growth of a
middle class in strong economies such as India and China coupled with
substantial population numbers.

By contrast, Australia’s economy
may be doing well, but its smaller population means less potential
advertising, while Japan suffers from an ageing society and stagnant
economy, he added.

“We see rising middle-class [numbers] in
Indonesia, India, China. You have self-serving markets with millions and
millions of people,” he said.

While there are still substantial
populations of the economically disadvantaged in Asia, buoyant consumer
confidence and increasing disposable incomes are driving consumption
across the board, though some sectors are doing better than others.

About
two-thirds of Asian shoppers made their final buying decisions on the
spot in stores, reflecting both the desire to spend as well as overall
confidence, Heekins said.

A study on shopping mindset by the
Grey Group released in July that covered more than 2,100 shoppers from
eight countries from Australia to India showed that for many people in
Asia, shopping is more than just picking up products.

The other
countries in the study were Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, China and
Vietnam.

While the Asian and United States markets were about
the same size now, Asia was likely to out grow the United States in the
next two or three years, and certainly by 2014.

“Of course, the
US is important because of its size and relative buoyancy, but as one
looks at Asia, barring some disastrous occurrences, you’re looking at
the next four, five years of double-digit growth,” he said.
 
“You’re
just not going to see that in the States or in Europe. Europe as you
know is struggling mightily.”

source: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/home/advertising-spending-in-asia-including-indonesia-to-surge-expert/407432 

Jakarta. As the gap between the
quality of education major cities and rural areas continues to grow, a
Central Java businessman has decided to train teachers to instill some
creativity into their students.

Adi Subana, who owns a tapioca
starch factory in Cilacap, worked with the district school board to hold
a seminar with the theme “Mengajar Secara Pintar” (“Teaching the Smart
Way”).

“If you compare the teaching methods of teachers in rural
areas like this to those in Jakarta, it’s obvious teachers here dictate
their students’ every move,” he said.

“As a result, the
students aren’t motivated to do anything on their own, because their
teachers tell them what they need to do all the time. While this method
helps improve the students’ discipline, it doesn’t teach them to become
creative.”

Besides the rigid teaching method, Adi also blames
the lack of new schools in his region for the widening educational gap.

“There
are more and more international-standard and private schools popping up
in Jakarta, whereas 95 percent of the schools here are still
state-owned,” he said.

These shortcomings are what prompted him
to hold the seminar for 150 elementary teachers from Cilacap’s
Karangpucung and Cimanggu subdistricts.

The keynote speaker was
Tessie Setiabudi, a motivational trainer and speaker with 20 years of
experience giving seminars to companies across Asia.

Tessie
focused on the newer and more effective teaching methods adopted by
educators in Jakarta and other major world cities.

“The schools
in Jakarta, especially the international ones, do a better job of
teaching their students to take the initiative and be creative, and this
is what teachers in rural areas need to improve on,” she said.

“The
first thing teachers need to have is the mind-set that all of their
students are smart, even before they begin teaching them.

“All
elementary school students have great potential, otherwise the students
would be at special schools for the disabled, so teachers need to
realize this first, instead of dictating the students’ every move. So
what the teachers need to do is further enhance the students’ creativity
and motivation.”

Tessie said one way teachers could do this was
to convince the students that their classroom was a sort of
“semi-playground,” rather than a place exclusively for studying and no
fun, which could set the children at ease.

“This can be done
through activities that stimulate the visual and aural senses, such as
games with pictures or listening exercises,” Tessie said.

She
also showed the teachers how they could help students remember key
points from lessons by including them in songs that were easy to
memorize.

Wahidin, a teacher who attended the seminar, praised
the new methods introduced at the event.

“Getting teachers to
create a more lively and playful atmosphere in the classroom will have
positive results for the students, as well as give the teachers a more
comfortable time teaching, so it’ll create a less stressful situation
for both sides,” he said.

“These types of training and
motivational programs are a huge plus for teachers in the area because I
think we’ve been stuck with the old teaching methods for too long, and
they need to be refreshed.

“I think the programs that Tessie
taught us will result in a positive long-term effect if applied well by
the teachers.”

The government has acknowledged the education gap
between rural and urban areas, but says addressing it will be a mammoth
task.

“We’re aware of the lack of teaching skills among
educators, so we’re trying to train them all to improve their teaching
methods, even though we’re short of funds and trainers,” National
Education Minister Muhammad Nuh told the Jakarta Globe. “We still have
much work to do.”

He said 74 percent of teachers across the
country were not certified as educators.

His ministry planned to
have 25,000 teachers trained this year, with more next year.

“We’re
also receiving help in terms of improving teachers’ skills from the
corporate social responsibility programs of companies like Pertamina,”
Nuh said, referring to the state oil and gas company.

Winarno
Surakhmad, a professor of education at Jakarta State University, blamed
the urban-rural gap on regional autonomy, adopted in 1999 to devolve
authority from Jakarta to regional administrations.

“We have 531
districts and towns in the country, which means we have 531 different
policies on education, and that includes teaching methods,” he said. We
need to standardize teaching methods before we train the teachers.”

source: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/education/factory-owner-gets-down-to-the-business-of-classroom-creativity/406820

Jakarta. Allegations that journalists demanded shares
from the Krakatau Steel IPO in exchange for favorable coverage of the
steel maker’s stock market debut this month have once again highlighted
the troubling practice of mercenary journalism.

The practice was
rampant in the early 2000s following the provision of press freedoms
enshrined in the 1999 Press Law, which effectively meant that print
media outlets no longer needed a license from the government.

Marah
Sakti Siregar, head of training at the Association of Indonesian
Journalists (PWI), said on Thursday that the recent recurrence of the
problem should prompt media and journalists’ associations “to get
together to address this problem more seriously.”

He said the
flourishing of media outlets had allowed some owners and journalists the
opportunity to misuse their press freedoms for personal, political or
corporate gain.

“It’s possible that the journalists in the
Krakatau Steel case didn’t hesitate to violate their ethics because they
were following examples set by their superiors,” Marah said.

Nezar
Patria, chairman of the Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI), said
his organization had long campaigned for its members not to receive
inappropriate payments for their reporting, and for other institutions
to not offer any such payments.

He said some regional
administrations allocated money for the media in their annual budgets,
with insufficient accountability.

“Not all the money is really
distributed to journalists, and some of the recipients are affiliated to
lesser-known media outlets whose role is ambiguous,” Nezar said, adding
that in some cases the media budget was yet another source of
embezzlement for officials in charge.

“They often collaborate
with some of the bogus journalists and file reports as though the budget
is really being spent on the journalists, while in fact it’s going into
their own pockets.”

He added that while such practices still
occurred, they were not as widespread as in the early years after press
freedoms were granted.

The decline, Nezar said, was due in part
to the fact that most credible media outlets routinely put out notices
calling on the public not to offer payments to their journalists.

“They’ve
also instilled this anti-envelope attitude in their journalists,” he
said, referring to the brown paper envelopes routinely used to give
bribes.

However, Nezar said bogus journalists continued to show
up at press conferences or other media events to shake down some
payments, seemingly staying informed of such events through a network of
their own.

“But they’re easy to identify,” he said. “Their
appearance is different from that of regular journalists, with whom they
don’t really mix.”

The PWI’s Marah said that while bogus
journalists hurt the reputation of the rest of the corps, many of them
are just trying to earn a living.

“We need to do something about
them, but let’s not forget the bigger violations committed by media
owners,” he said.

source: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/media/indonesian-reporters-for-hire-infractions-on-both-sides-of-the-news/407324

Indonesia. The deadly eruption of
Indonesia’s Mount Merapi has weakened allowing the government to further
reduce the restriction zone around the mountain, a volcanologist said
on Friday.

The eruption’s “intensity has decreased significantly
for about two weeks,” government’s volcanologist Surono said adding that
officials decided to reduce the danger zone for the second time since
last weekend.

In the most threatened areas, south of the crater,
the zone was reduced to 15 kilometers from 20 kilometers.

More
than 270 people died after Merapi exploded on November 5 in its biggest
eruption in more than a century.

The volcano, a sacred landmark
in Javanese tradition whose name translates as “Mountain of Fire”,
killed around 1,300 people in 1930 but experts say the current eruptions
are its biggest convulsions since 1872.

source: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/home/danger-zone-reduced-as-indonesian-eruption-weakens/407435

Jakarta. After being hospitalized twice and still failing to get a conclusive diagnosis or satisfactory answers on what she was suffering from, Arini Putri decided to turn to the Internet for answers. 



In an age where access to information is afforded by the World Wide Web, Arini is one of an increasing number of Indonesians going online or using social media sites like Twitter to confirm medical opinions as well as consult directly with doctors. 



Three doctors — not the Internet — eventually figured out that Arini was suffering from a chronic bladder infection. 



“But they only figured out I was suffering from such an infection after I underwent a slew of tests and spent two weeks bedridden. It was so irritating,” the 21-year-old college student said. 



Arini was still not satisfied with the information and advice from her doctors, so she once again turned to the Internet. 



She wanted to learn what kind of food she could eat or should stay away from, and what kind of activities she must steer clear of to avoid a relapse. 



“I just felt surer and safer re-checking what they [the doctors] told me by looking it up on the Internet,” Arini said. 



It was only via the Internet that Arini learned about the ways in which the infection would affect her, and also the exact pricing of medicines prescribed to her. She said she wanted to make sure that the hospital had not overcharged her for unnecessary tests and medicines. And Arini does not seem to be the only one going online when ill. 



A survey released late this October found that 83 percent of doctors in Indonesia acknowledged that their patients used the Internet to confirm information or diagnoses and opinions they received from physicians. 



The study was conducted from January through May this year by IndoPacific Edelman and the research division of the faculty of public health at University of Indonesia. 



The survey also found that the Internet was the No. 1 choice for doctors themselves when in need of the latest medical news. 



Being the interactive tool that it is, some doctors have proactively been harnessing the power of the Web to increase awareness of health issues. 



Ophthalmologist Ferdiriva Hamzah, for instance, has nearly 3,000 followers on Twitter. 



Ferdiriva said he had tried to squeeze some time out for a Q&A session with his followers. 



“Some people still actually believe that rinsing irritated eyes with juice from betel leaves is fine. But it’s dangerous. Fungus could grow and it can lead to blindness,” he said. 



He added that Twitter was also helping him to spread vital information during the Mount Merapi crisis. 



After the eruption, Ferdiriva tweeted that volunteers and people living near Merapi should remove their contact lenses because wearing them while ash was raining down could endanger their corneas. 



The tweet went viral and the information spread quickly because many people forwarded the message. 



He also uses Twitter to share information about diseases. He once made a video about retinoblastoma, a retina-related cancer, and it received an overwhelming response. 



He keeps in contact with those of his patients who live outside Jakarta through Twitter, including one patient who lives in a far-flung village in Kalimantan. 



Nurhadi Rahman, a general practitioner studying to become a gynecologist, also uses Twitter to promote Selamatkan Ibu a movement establish to reduce the maternal mortality rate. 



Along with friends, he provides information about reproductive health and how to save a mother’s life. 



The account has more than 3,500 followers. The most common questions? What and what not to do during a pregnancy and how to reduce childbirth-related risks. 



Nurhadi said social networking has an advantage over other media because it can provide a two-way discussion between the doctors and the patients. 



He gave the example of a Twitter account and Web site called blogdokter, belonging to a doctor in Atambua, East Nusa Tenggara. 



The account has nearly 20,000 followers asking about everyday health problems. 



“With that kind of power it will be easier to promote awareness about health and we will save more lives,’ he said. 



For Dian Argarini, 30, a mother of two and a recent Twitter convert, the Internet is helping to keep her children healthy. She said she loved to collect information about virus mutations and new diseases. 



Dian added that having doctors on Twitter helped her to handle family health problems. 



“When my baby has a fever, I find it very useful to ask for tips from the doctor. I describe the symptoms and the doctor gives me tips,” she said.

source:  http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/health/patients-doctors-turn-to-internet-for-a-second-opinion/405807