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Green Sidewalks, Solar Panels Part of Youth’s Ideas to Improve Jakarta
Francezka Nangoy | February 19, 2012

Young Indonesians submitted more than 600 ideas designed to improve the well-being of the country as part of the “+” Project by Royal Philips Electronics, including using solar power to light sidewalks at night. (AFP Photo) Young Indonesians submitted more than 600 ideas designed to improve the well-being of the country as part of the “+” Project by Royal Philips Electronics, including using solar power to light sidewalks at night. (AFP Photo)
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DrDez
2:17pm Feb 19, 2012

more interference by the Dutch JPB...

facepalm
1:36pm Feb 19, 2012

From creating greener sidewalks to using technology to clean rivers, young Indonesians have produced a wealth of ideas on how to improve the well-being of the country.

All of which, I think we can unanimously agree, will be overlooked by SBY & co.


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Bangkok. From creating greener sidewalks to using technology to clean rivers, young Indonesians have produced a wealth of ideas on how to improve the well-being of the country.

More than 600 ideas were submitted by Indonesians over eight weeks as part of the “+” Project by Royal Philips Electronics, according to Arent Jan Hesselink, the company’s head of communications for Asia Pacific.

Entries fell into three categories: “livable city,” “access to health care” and “healthy living.”

A winner in each category will be announced within two weeks and each winner will be given funding to help them turn their ideas into reality.

“One of the ideas that struck me is to look at areas in Jakarta that are unsafe and provide proper lightning to make them safer,” Hesselink said.

Proper lighting, he added, has proven to help cut crime rates.

One of the entries suggested the use of solar panels to power lights along sidewalks. The idea would not only lower energy consumption, according to the person who submitted it, but would hopefully motivate people to walk, giving them exercise and helping cut the amount of pollution from vehicles.

Another idea submitted in the “livable city” category was to create green sidewalks, where the main street and the sidewalk would be separated by tall plants to protect pedestrians from smoke and dust.

Chris ter Steege, head of digital marketing at Philips Asia Pacific, said Indonesia’s booming users of social media like Twitter and Facebook, as well as its large population of young people, had been big factors in the success of the project in the country.

“It was quite amazing what we’ve found in Indonesia. Even compared to other global projects we’ve done before, this is quite impressive and we are happy about that,” Steege said.

After being launched in Indonesia, the “+” Project continued on to Thailand. The Dutch company launched the project in Bangkok on Feb. 8 and invited a reporter from the Jakarta Globe to the event.

“Thais and Indonesians are quite the same. Especially the young people, and access to Internet is also huge,” said Viroj Vithayaveroj, a general manager at Thailand’s Philips Electronics.