VZCZCXYZ0009
OO RUEHWEB

DE RUEHJA #3194/01 3171026
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
O 131026Z NOV 06
FM AMEMBASSY JAKARTA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 2048
RUEHPH/CDC ATLANTA GA IMMEDIATE
INFO RUEAUSA/DEPT OF HHS WASHINGTON DC IMMEDIATE
RUEHRC/USDA FAS WASHDC IMMEDIATE
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC IMMEDIATE
RHMFIUU/BUMED WASHINGTON DC

UNCLAS JAKARTA 013194 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR EAP/MLS, EAP/IET, MED/DASHO/EMR AND MED 
DEPT FOR G/AIAG AND OES 
DEPT PASS TO USDA/FAS/DLP/HWETZEL AND FAS/ICD/LAIDIG 
DEPT ALSO PASS TO USDA/FAS/FAA/DYOUNG AND USDA/APHIS/ANNELLI 
DEPT ALSO PASS TO USAID/ANE/CLEMENTS AND GH/CARROLL 
DEPT ALSO PASS TO HHS/WSTEIGER/ABHAT/MSTLOUIS AND HHS/NIH 
NSC FOR JMELINE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: TBIO AMED CASC EAGR AMGT PGOV ID KFLU
SUBJECT: INDONESIA - AVIAN INFLUENZA (AI) AND THE PRESIDENT"S 
VISIT 
 
REF: A) Jakarta 13143 (NAMRU Negotiations) 
     B) Jakarta 12828 (AI Update) 
     C) Jakarta 12775 (GOI 2007 budget) 
     D) Jakarta 11379 (GOI Social Spending) 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary.  Although the Government of Indonesia has not 
yet finalized its FY 2007 allocations for AI control programs, 
senior GOI officials including Coordinating Minister Bakrie and 
Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani Indrawati have assured the 
Embassy that total AI spending will match or exceed 2006 levels. 
The Ambassador and Foreign Ministry Director General Eddi 
Hariyadhi opened negotiations on a new Memorandum of 
Understanding for the Naval Medical Research Unit (NAMRU-2) on 
November 9.  At that meeting, Dr. Triono Soendoro, the Director 
of the Indonesian National Institutes of Health Research and 
Development advocated strongly on NAMRU-2's behalf.  On November 
8, an Embassy interagency team conducted a site visit to Bogor to 
see the Participatory Disease Surveillance (PDS) program in 
action and better understand the Participatory Disease 
Surveillance/Response program (PDS/PDR).  With our AI agenda 
moving forward on all fronts, we continue to urge Washington to 
announce a bold deliverable of increased USG financial assistance 
on AI during the President's November 20 visit.  End Summary. 
 
AI Budget Remains Unclear But Assurances Given 
--------------------------------------------- - 
 
¶2. (U)  Despite our efforts to seek GOI clarification on AI 
program spending, the GOI has not yet finalized this information. 
Parliament passed a broad FY 2007 budget on October 17, but this 
document does not contain program-by-program spending breakdowns. 
The GOI will likely release more detailed program information o/a 
November 30.   However, Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati, 
in a meeting with the Ambassador on October 30, reiterated that 
the GOI would increase its AI spending in 2007, not decrease it. 
This statement is similar to Coordinating Minister for People's 
Welfare Aburizal Bakrie's announcement to the press on September 
¶15. 
 
¶3. (SBU) On November 7, Executive Secretary for the National 
Committee for AI Control and Pandemic Prevention Bayu 
Krisnamurthi  told us that he will not know final AI numbers 
until November 15 at the earliest.  However, Bayu assured us that 
total AI spending would not be lower than 2006 levels.  He 
further explained that last year, GOI treated AI spending similar 
to "disaster management" spending.  However, this year, senior 
officials have recognized AI as a long term problem that must be 
budgeted and organized accordingly.  Bayu noted therefore that 
analysts' efforts to compare AI spending relative to last year 
may not result in a simple apples-to-apples comparison.  Pots of 
money may be different. 
 
NAMRU Negotiations Underway 
--------------------------- 
 
¶4. (SBU) Ambassador Pascoe and Deplu Director General [xxxxx] 
opened negotiations on a new NAMRU-2 MOU on November 9.  The 
negotiations lasted for several hours.  During the negotiation 
session, Dr. Triono Soendoro, the Director of the Indonesian 
National Institutes of Health Research and Development strongly 
advocated on NAMRU-2's behalf.  Both sides agreed to stress the 
importance of NAMRU-2 in the visit communiqu and resume 
discussions after the President's visit. 
 
PDS/PDR Program Observations 
---------------------------- 
 
¶5. (U) On November 8, representatives from NAMRU-2, APHIS, FAS, 
USAID and the Economics Section visited Bogor for a field site 
visit to better understand the Food and Agricultural Organization 
(FAO) PDS/PDR program.  Two veterinarians, including one poultry 
specialist from APHIS and one veterinarian from NAMRU-2 
participated in the site visit.  The field trip included a 
presentation given by FAO representatives, followed by a brief 
visit to the Local Disease Control Center and observation of PDS 
team interviews in the field.  Throughout the trip, the group 
discussed the issues of vaccination, culling, compensation, 
program staffing, and PDS/PDR strengths and limitations. 
 
Usefulness and Availability of Vaccine 
-------------------------------------- 
 
¶6. (U) The team discussed with FAO presenters vaccine policy, 
supply and effectiveness.  The GOI blanket vaccination policy 
suffers from limitations including the potential for vaccinators 
to spread the disease and insufficient vaccine supply.  There is 
some evidence of chickens dying with AI symptoms soon after 
vaccination.  There may be two reasons for this: vaccinators may 
be vaccinating already infected chickens or vaccinators may 
unwittingly carry the virus from farm to farm.  The PDR team 
trains poultry owners to vaccinate poultry at their own farms to 
avoid spreading the virus. 
 
¶7. (U) FAO raised the issue of limited vaccine supply.  Currently 
the Government of Indonesia (GOI) has only 45 million doses of 
vaccine against an estimated need of 1.2 billion.  However, the 
Minster of Agriculture announced last week that the GOI would 
make available 450 million doses in the 2007 budget cycle.  The 
World Bank and USAID will also provide additional vaccine in 
early 2007 and USAID will pilot social marketing of the vaccine 
as a more sustainable long-term community financed approach. 
However, additional resources will be necessary to meet the 
vaccine need. 
 
Culling, Compensation, and PDS/PDR Staffing 
------------------------------------------- 
 
¶8. (U) FAO recommends focal culling when teams identify AI 
infected chickens.  The GOI has a compensation program of Rps 
12,500 per culled bird (about US$1.35) that is rarely applied. 
FAO noted that decentralization and fear of anti-corruption laws 
play a significant role in hampering timely compensation to 
affected farmers.  Decentralization impedes the speed of funds 
flowing from national to local levels.  Given limited 
compensation, poultry owners are often reluctant to cull and PDR 
teams must persuade local communities that culling is in their 
best long-term interests.  FAO reported at present, approximately 
50% of focal culling was taking place through PDR.  In other 
areas not covered by PDR, culling is rare.  In collaboration with 
the FAO and USG, the World Bank has earmarked funds for 
developing a more effective compensation system. 
 
¶9. (U) FAO stated that training was ongoing. By May 2007, FAO 
will have trained 1240 Ministry of Agriculture staff members (650 
teams) and approximately 200 trainers in PDS/PDR. 
 
PDS/PDR Successes and Challenges 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶10. (U) The visiting embassy team noted that the primary strength 
of the PDS/PDR program is that FAO teams are on the ground, 
highly focused on the issue, and gain significant insights about 
the prevalence, nature and spread of AI among poultry 
populations.  Teams interview numerous farmers, local village 
leaders and owners in the informal poultry sector (sector 3-4). 
By speaking to this largely informal sector, PDS/PDR officials 
are able to gain valuable information and educate the population 
on preventative measures and dealing rapidly with outbreaks. 
 
¶11. (U) FAO representatives acknowledged that the PDS/PDR program 
alone will not contain AI given compensation and culling 
challenges, ineffective poultry transportation regulations, 
insufficient vaccination programs, and the absence of full 
implementation of the GOI national strategic plan.  FAO stressed 
that the effort to contain the disease will require additional 
inputs from GOI, FAO, and the international donor community.  The 
U.S. Department of Agriculture representative also cited the lack 
of a comprehensive policy to control the virus in larger 
industrial farms (sector 1-2) as a significant weakness in the 
effort to control the disease in Indonesia, although this lies 
outside the scope of the PDS/PDR program.  Observers noted the 
need for PDS/PDR teams to provide local communities with 
handouts, flyers and other ancillary items to ensure better 
knowledge of safe poultry rearing and handling practices and to 
provide ongoing references on poultry and human health risks. 
FAO officials stress that they welcome opportunities to improve 
the program and will conduct an external evaluation of all 
Southeast Asia FAO AI programs in January 2007. 
 
 
Comment: POTUS Visit: Important Opportunity on AI 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
 
¶13. (SBU) We share the view of other donors that the GOI has made 
significant progress in the past year in managing the AI threat. 
But even under the best case budget scenario, GOI will not be 
able to meet the requirements for an effective revised AI control 
program without increased contributions from donors, including 
the U.S.  Perhaps more importantly, announcing a major increase 
of USG assistance for AI control programs will give us strong 
leverage to seek a stronger private and public commitment from 
President Yudhoyono to increase the GOI's AI control programs. 
The Indonesian press has already reported that Presidents Bush 
and Yudhoyono will discuss AI control during President Bush's 
visit, and announcing an increase in assistance would enable us 
to show that we are ready to back up our concern with concrete 
assistance.  In this context, we continue to urge Washington to 
announce a bold deliverable of increased AI financial assistance 
during the President's November 20 visit. 
 
PASCOE