Clareta, who is Bali Project Development Manager for Habitat Indonesia, was introduced by Ginny, and she was assisted by Nenden who also works for Habitat.  Ginny had met Clareta through Susie at Melamun Hotel - so it seems that when we are looking for guest speakers, one strategy is to visit Melamun where Susie has many interesting contacts.

The history of Habitat for Humanity goes back to 1976 when it began in the US, and now it operates in over 100 countries.  The Indonesian branch began in 1997.  Archie mentioned that past US President Jummy Carter has been a keen supporter of Habitat for Humanity.  Here are some links

• the Habitat for Humanity web site is at http://www.habitat.org/ - and it works out where you are and gives you the Asia-Pacific version - but allows you to pick another region if you want
• there is an Indonesian Habitat web-site at http://www.habitatindonesia.org/
• Wikipedia has a good article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habitat_for_Humanity_International
• the Jimmy Carter connection is described in the Habitat web-site - http://www.habitat.org/how/carter.aspx

Clareta had a really good slide presentation with over 30 slides.  This is a PDF file - it is 4.6MB, so will take a few minutes over slower connections - but is well worth the wait.

So I am not going to summarise the talk - it is better that you view the slides - I will just make a few observations

• Habitat International is basically a Christian organisation with a vision that everyone needs good housing, so their aid goes to lower income people from any country, any religion, etc
• in Rotary we meet many non government organisations (NGOs) working with different classes of needy people.  My impression of Habitat is that they are very realistic and well organised.  Have a look at the slides and see what you think.
• they have 3 ways of helping
  • for very poor people - direct aid - just provide a house
  • for people with low incomes - subsidize - expect partial repayment
  • for people with a bit more - provide finance - expect full repayment
• they talk of Rp20,000,000 to build a basic house - this is just materials as the labour is volunteered.  (The cost of building in Bali is said to be Rp4,000,000 or more per square metre - so you would only get 5 sq metres for this money if built by builders to standards we expect.  But since they are just paying materials only and building simply maybe they get 10-20 sq metre.)

Clareta can be contacted at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it