In Indonesia, the expression gotong royong means offering assistance, sharing burdens and working with others. Throughout our more than 80 years in Indonesia, Chevron has embraced gotong royong by working with communities, governments, and local and international nongovernmental organizations to provide disaster relief and recovery, small business and enterprise development, education and vocational training, health services, and environmental conservation.
In 2012, we supported the 18th National Games, the first ever to be held in Riau. Our support included the construction of Chevron Balai Tanjak Laksamana, a multipurpose building at the Rumbai Sports Complex. This 47,000-square-foot facility can accommodate 1,500 to 2,000 spectators and will provide long-term benefits for a variety of social activities. We also helped promote the National Games by setting up and managing the main media center in the Riau Central Library for journalists covering this quadrennial event. Both facilities will be used for the Islamic Solidarity Games in the summer of 2013. The value of our assistance for the 18th National Games is estimated at approximately $6.4 million.
Education and Vocational Training
PT Chevron Pacific Indonesia (CPI) supports the education of the Sakai people, an indigenous tribe in Riau. CPI provides books, teacher incentives and educational grants to thousands of Sakai children through our Beasiswa Anak Asuh Sakai (Sakai Foster Children Scholarship) program. In addition, we provide scholarships for higher education through the Darmasiswa Chevron Riau scholarship program. Since it began in 2001, the program has helped 685 students.
CPI built and sponsors two polytechnic schools to train Indonesian students for jobs in the industrial sector. Riau Caltex Polytechnic, the province's first polytechnic university, offers a curriculum to match the province's business needs and contribute to its economic growth. More than 1,400 students have graduated from the university. More than 1,200 students are enrolled. Our second such school, Politeknik Aceh, in Banda Aceh, was built with our partners in the long-term recovery effort following the 2004 tsunami. More than 310 students have graduated from the first two classes. Politeknik Aceh has a current enrollment of 432.
Chevron supports a range of other educational programs:
- We started a school development program in East Kalimantan to improve the quality of education for schools in remote areas through teacher training and equipment assistance.
- Since 2008, our educational SuperCamp program in West Java has helped more than 700 students, with about 90 percent moving on to college.
- Our youth vocational training program offers courses in welding, automotive, heavy-equipment operation, carpentry, electricity, cell phone repair and entrepreneurship. In partnership with Politeknik Caltex Riau, we also provided selected graduates with an endowment fund to start their own businesses.
- Our Newspaper in Education program helps enrich English instruction for more than 6,000 students and 750 teachers from 100 schools in 23 cities over nine provinces across Indonesia.
- Since 2006, as part of Chevron's global University Partnership Program, we have provided Bandung Institute of Technology with graduate fellowships, distance learning and internship programs, as well as improved the quality of its laboratories. In July 2012, we extended the program to the University of Gadjah Mada, where we committed to provide education support and research assistance for five years.
Health Services
Chevron supports programs that fight HIV/AIDS and other diseases, improve health care, and support health education, with special emphasis on mothers and children.
We provided $5 million to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria for HIV/AIDS programs in Indonesia. We also helped establish the "I Wanna Live" HIV/AIDS awareness campaign for middle school and high school students and teachers in West Java. It has reached more than 25,000 youngsters.
Chevron worked with local government and organizations to improve maternal and newborn health services in 10 villages in Riau and East Kalimantan. A program targeting health center workers, volunteers and midwives aimed to improve the health of pregnant women and their infants by enhancing community capacity and access to quality maternal and newborn health services. We also helped them prepare for childbirth and obstetric and newborn complications using Desa Siaga (Alert Village). The "Alert" Village initiative advocates that everyone should play a part in helping to save mothers' lives.
Small Business and Micro Enterprise Development
Chevron supports programs that offer training in agriculture, fisheries and small business development. These include the following:
- The Local Business Development program helps small companies and cooperatives in Sumatra, East Kalimantan and West Java develop into professional and competitive suppliers of goods and services. Over the past six years, more than 3,800 contracts have been awarded and approximately 9,500 jobs have been created.
- A community-based enterprise development program in East Kalimantan and West Java offers loans through a micro finance institution and provides business management training to small business groups and cooperatives.
- The Coastal Community Empowerment program in East Kalimantan supported sustainable economic development in local coastal communities and the region by offering workshops in seaweed cultivation, fishpond production and other skills. A new group for people with disabilities and women in Balikpapan is receiving training, equipment, materials and marketing help to produce environmentally-friendly batik products.
- More than 620 cattle farmers in Darajat, West Java, benefit from an integrated sheep breeding program, which includes technical training in waste management, biopesticide and biogas as well as micro financing.
- The UKM Center in Darajat serves as a learning and business consulting center for small and medium-sized businesses and showcases 75 products made by 32 groups in the area. The development program has increased the community income by 40 percent.
- We promote conservation efforts in our Salak geothermal operations to prevent further exploitation of the forest. We support small and medium-sized enterprises by offering training to improve farming practices, which has increased the harvest.
- We introduced an integrated farming practice to the Sakai people in Riau by providing them with agricultural, fishery and livestock training as well as technical assistance.
Disaster Relief and Rehabilitation
Chevron has been quick to step in to help communities recover and rebuild after natural disasters.
In 2009 following devastating earthquakes in West Sumatra and West Java, we launched the Chevron Earthquake Recovery Initiative. We established a $1.8 million school rehabilitation program and partnered with national and local governments and nongovernmental organizations to rebuild four severely damaged schools in West Java and West Sumatra.
Following the 2004 tsunami, which hit Indonesia particularly hard, we responded with the Chevron Aceh Recovery Initiative. We contributed approximately $15 million for immediate relief and long-term rehabilitation initiatives focused on providing vocational skills and economic development opportunities for residents of Aceh through the Riau Caltex Polytechnic and the development of Politeknik Aceh.
To help tsunami victims who want to create their own businesses, Chevron supports the Business Startup Establishment project in Aceh. It is working to create 6,000 jobs by offering micro financing, training and business planning support for local entrepreneurs.
Updated: April 2013
Cautionary Statement