THE EDITOR – The Indonesian government monitors the use of village financial funds through an electronic system so that the Ministry of Finance and related institutions can see the progress of budget utilization in each village to urban village.
Director of Village Funds, Incentives, Special Autonomy, and Privileges Jaka Sucipta said that the Ministry of Finance is tasked with fostering the management of village funds starting from how the budget is allocated, distributed, monitored and evaluated, to reporting.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Home Affairs is tasked with planning, budgeting, implementing activities, structuring, reporting, and being accountable for the funds used by each village.
“Meanwhile, the Ministry of Villages and Development of Disadvantaged Regions is tasked with following up on the stipulation of village ministerial regulations every year,” said Jaka at the National Village and Urban Village Work Meeting held recently in Bali, Indonesia.
HOW IS THE WORK PROCESS?
Jaka said that the government uses an application called Siskeudes which must also be used by all village heads in Indonesia.
It is divided into two parts, namely Siskeudes Online and Siskeudes Desktop. In Siskeudes Online, data will be sent automatically according to the time of input. Meanwhile, in the latter, the data will be received directly by the local government.
The data, he continued, can be seen by the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Villages and Development of Disadvantaged Regions, and the Financial and Development Supervisory Agency (BPKP).
VILLAGE FUNDS MUST ALSO BE USED TO PREVENT CLIMATE CHANGE
Jaka said that the government asked village heads to actively participate in protecting climate change in their respective areas. This is because the losses incurred by the state due to natural disasters each year have reached IDR 20-50 trillion.
“In Indonesia, natural disasters have an impact on the poverty rate. One in 10 Indonesians are vulnerable to falling into poverty due to natural disasters,” he said.
The government is preparing a fund of IDR 8-12 million per village to support climate change management.
This budget is used for a variety of activities, such as river normalization, irrigation and waterway construction, alternative and renewable energy development, and also waste management.
A LOT OF CHALLENGES
However, Jaka said, there are still many challenges that must be faced in intervening in village funds specifically used to address climate change.
Among others, the inclusion of the level of risk of climate change impacts down to the village level, the absence of data on village alignments towards climate mitigation and adaptation actions, codification from the Ministry of Home Affairs for the sake of the formation of village fund allocation, and the lack of administrative data on rural areas.
For this reason, he said that the Ministry of Finance is currently monitoring the mapping of village funds received by the authorities.
SISKEUDES APPLICATION HELPS THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT TO MONITOR THE PERFORMANCE OF VILLAGE HEADS
Jaka said that the Siskeudes application makes it easier for the central government from various institutions to monitor the performance of village officials – who are known to be not all university graduates.
Through this application, he continued, the Ministry of Finance can see the distribution of village funds in each village and monitor their use in detail as village funds will be sent directly to village treasuries.
This system, according to him, is the most appropriate method so that the funds can be used directly by the community at the lowest level, including for handling climate change.
Each regional government, he continued, will record the income as revenue and expenditure.
Meanwhile, the central government can monitor the use of village funds for disaster mitigation online.
