A million-dollar deal to aid Indonesian health service management will be launched at Charles Sturt University today. Two major AusAid contracts in Indonesia have been won by a consortium involving Australian Business Health Ltd and Charles Sturt University. The first of these projects involves designing and delivering a series of management training and professional development workshops in Indonesia to some 360 district and provincial health sector managers.

The second project sees two groups of 24 senior Indonesian health sector managers visiting Australia for periods of between two and three months. The first group, which is currently undergoing an intensive English language training course in Jakarta, will arrive in Australia in September 1999, and the second in mid 2000. The visitors will spend the bulk of their time on the CSU Bathurst campus, with week-long study trips to Wagga Wagga and Dubbo scheduled as part of their program. Site visits to local hospitals and other health facilities have been arranged to complement classroom activities.

CSU Health Studies Faculty Dean Professor David Battersby said both contracts were targeted towards strengthening Indonesia's health service management expertise, as the country enters an era of unprecedented public sector reform, designed to enhance entrepreneurship, autonomy and local decision making. Together the projects are worth almost one million dollars.

"The project's main purpose is to improve the skill and knowledge base of clinician-managers and administrators working at district and provincial level in Indonesia," he said.

A team led by Ms Ene Juurma from Australia Business Health and Associate Professor Peter Lloyd from CSU's School of Public Health will manage the project.

To gather the team and launch the projects, the University is hosting a lunch at its Bathurst Campus today (Monday 19 July) for members of the consortium who will be travelling to Indonesia on Sunday 1 August.