Indonesian free meal programme faces hurdles on food safety, funds management

Students eat lunch on the first day of the free-meal programme at a junior high school in Cimahi, West Java, on January 6, 2025. Calls have grown for President Prabowo Subianto’s administration to suspend and reevaluate the programme amid cases of food poisoning and a report of embezzlement of funds earmarked for the initiative. - AFP

JAKARTA: Almost four months into the rollout of the free nutritious meals programme, President Prabowo Subianto recently boasted about its achievements, claiming that he had heard praise from officials in other countries about the initiative’s rapid expansion when compared to similar programmes in other countries.

When the programme was first launched on January 6, it aimed to feed 600,000 recipients, mostly schoolchildren. The number gradually grew to three million recipients by April, before officials expanded the targeted population to 82.9 million students and pregnant women by the end of 2025.