The Philippines boasts of 7,100 plus islands and a high literacy rate.

Indonesia beats us by 10,000 islands and a literacy rate that is higher in all aspects: functional, cultural and media-wise. They have also beaten us in the public broadcasting system game.

While we are still debating over the merits of PBS and its usefulness to education, no thanks to mindless politicians, Indonesia resolutely and without fanfare launched their own PBS, joining the league of Japan, China, Singapore, Malaysia, America, Canada and much of Europe.

Gatot Budi Utomo is among Indonesia’s vanguards in PBS and is a staunch believer in using television for education. Rather than making TV a likely adversary, which is what the recent Bantay TV movement of the Department of Education purports to do, Utomo and his colleagues have harnessed the power of the airwaves to make a difference in the lives of the archipelago’s 94 million children.

Virtually 39 per cent of Indonesia’s 240 million population is under 18. It made sense to Utomo and his colleagues to launch a PBS channel.

“Our children are known to watch 5 hours of TV a day on the average,” Utomo explains, “and that translates to 1,820 hours of TV viewing a year. On the other hand, Indonesian children attend only 1,000 hours of school yearly!”

Utomo has offered Anak TV help in shoring up interest in PBS by sharing his experience in Jakarta. He is particularly proud of a program that he helps produce called “Aku Anak Desa” (I am a Villager Child) which like the Philippines’ Kabataan News Network fields child reporters who file reports about their observations of happenings in their own hometowns and communities.

A country as diverse and widely spread like Indonesia faithfully pushes the one-language, one- nation idea and succeeds. The TV show is another vehicle to foster that idea among children who are slowly being affected by too Western intrusion in their culture and daily lives brought about by unabated
media usage.

Sometime in July, Indonesia staged a successful No TV Day to call attention to the importance of reading, socializing, sports and pursuing other hobbies and pastimes. It was a colossal militant undertaking to stress upon children to accept that their lives should not be shaped by television alone. The one day abstinence from television was supported even by TV networks and advertisers who unanimously agreed that banishing TV at least one day in children’s lives allows the kids to put their young lives in perspective.

It was a chance for Utomo to repeat to producers, directors and presenters all over the Indonesian archipelago what they should constantly remember when broadcasting for children.

Children are not expected to know that TV programs are constructions and communication strategies but they somehow have an idea how shows are made. It also promotes respectful broadcasting to help children make sense of what they see. Violence and sensationalism easily grab audiences’
attentions and must therefore be used sparingly and wisely. And finally, all TV programs have a underlying economic purpose but children are not full fledged consumers so why hit on them?