Model UN Indonesia Third Main Committee Position Paper
Position Paper
Maddie Johnson
Indonesia is developmentally slow in terms of keeping modern and up to date with today’s forms of contraceptives and birth control. Progress has been made and is still being made, but there is always work to be done.
Through not allowing Indonesian women the access and the choice of birth control we are denying protection and freedom. How are we denying protection? Protection from unwanted pregnancy that could lead to disastrous results is not provided. Many lack basic health care and a basic form of contraception that could save a lot of trouble. Protection from the dangers of childbirth, especially without basic health care, is absolutely necessary.
One woman dies every 90 seconds in pregnancy or childbirth worldwide. Why is prevention and protection not an option? How are we denying freedom? The basic right to decide what to do with one’s body is taken away through only allowing limited access of contraception. The freedom of taking away the choice and decision making process of pregnancy and making it automatic and incapable to rid is the result. Many simply lack the education on pregnancy necessary to have a successful one. Violence against women increases during pregnancy. Every single woman deserves the right to quality maternal health care. Many sexual rights activists receive harassment. There is a lack of protection for human rights in Indonesia with few people advocating for improvement there. The issue of Reproductive rights and Contraceptive use goes unnoticed and unchanged there.
Amnesty’s work to protect human rights is always advocating for bettering humanitarian rights, however when you selected Indonesia it read: Amnesty International does not currently have a presence in this country. How is it that we can other countries can receive help and charity and kindness with their issues but not Indonesia .Women’s rights especially reproductive ones are a pressing issue that needs to be addressed in Indonesia.
Indonesia particularly has made some progress in the last 30 years as briefly stated before, however, there is always more work to be done. A reduction in family planning and less interference with the public sector has led to lower contraceptive use for women recently. The issue is, it’s the moderate to extremely poor women without the proper access to birth control and other methods that are getting pregnant. They cannot afford children and had no useful tools or information prior to becoming pregnant that could have prevented it in the first place. The poor have more children than the wealthy because they are unable to obtain the modern methods of birth control that we all know are available.
Government interaction to help provide an education and tools necessary to prove to women that smaller family size and family planning will provide positive outcomes would make a huge difference. The National Family Planning Coordinating Board founded in
1970 has made a major difference in instilling the idea of a smaller family as a norm. The

Total Fertility Rate dropped from 5.6 to 2.6 lifetime births per woman, during the same period. A drop in government subsidies during a time of economic struggle did not prove disastrous as consumers of contraceptives in Indonesia simply turned and switched to the private sector. Research shows that exposure to family planning messages is strongly associated with increased contraceptive use. There is a connection there. Traditional cultural methods have proved overall to be ineffective and so it’s best for modernization to be pushed for. Poor people are more likely to use the family planning tools the government provides which would lead to less impoverished children. The sociocultural factors lead to barriers between the poor and rich in terms of contraceptive use. Contraceptive security is not promised to the poor women of Indonesia and needs to be reinforced and insured as well as assured that they will get the care that they need. Contraceptives are not used for various reasons including fear, religious beliefs, attitudes, side effects, and an overall lack of knowledge. To women in Indonesia there is little female liberation and often they think that the amount of children they bear is up to God or their husbands. They are very traditional in this and partially explain why contraceptives are a taboo. Statistics show that poorer women do not discuss contraceptive use with their spouses as the richer do and so this is an explanation for lack of use. Both the public sector and private midwives are means of how women obtain contraceptives. The midwives are flexible in terms of pricing and different price situations.
Overall, women do have a choice when it comes to birth control, but there are many limits considering many rely on the government to teach and provide for them information and tools needed for successful Reproduction and Contraceptive use. Many women are not open about it because of the culture, but this is something they should continue to work on because it would deflate many issues.