President Prabowo Commits to Perfecting MBG Program

REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, BANDUNG -- President Prabowo Subianto reiterated his commitment to continue refining the implementation of the Free Nutritious Meals (MBG) program. The goal is that no longer cases of food poisoning are found.

“But we want zero errors, we want zero defects. Although it is very difficult, but we have to. We have ordered all kitchens, which means the tools are best for cleaning. So we will continue to perfect,” Prabowo said in a scientific oration at the Graduation of Universitas Kebangsaan Republik Indonesia (UKRI) in Bandung, West Java, on Saturday (18/10/2025).

Prabowo admits that MBG's program is not entirely perfect. Since its launch, he added, there are still several thousand children who have indigestion or food poisoning.

However, he insists, cases of poisoning that occurred in some areas do not illustrate the program's failures. “In the implementation until now there were several thousand children who had stomach pains, food poisoning, but what was raised was poisoning, as if this program had to be stopped,” Prabowo said.

 The chairman of the Gerindra Party DPP said that so far, the MBG program has reached 36.2 million beneficiaries. In total, more than 1.3 to 1.4 billion servings of food have been distributed to the public.

Of that number, about 8,000 cases of food poisoning were recorded, which statistically equates to 0.0007 percent, or the success rate of the program stands at 99.99 percent. “So where there's a human effort that's 99.99 percent successful, it's pretty much a failure. But we don't want there to be one, there shouldn't be a single sick child,” Prabowo said.

According to him, cases of poisoning can be caused by various factors, including the quality of foodstuffs and hygiene in the process of serving. Therefore, Prabowo requested that hygiene aspects continue to be improved throughout the program executives' kitchens.

“Probably because the food is less good, less clean, and so on. But if 1.4 billion divided by 8,000, I guess this is still if in science, in science, this is still in the corridor,” Prabowo said.