Susi Pudjiastuti The Value Of The People Needs More Basic Food Than A Free Rice Cooker Of IDR 347 Billion From The Government

Former Minister of Fisheries and Marine Affairs Susi Pudjiastuti. (Between)

JAKARTA - Former Minister of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Susi Pudjiastuti spoke about the government's program to distribute free rice cookers, which will cost Rp347 billion.

According to Susi, the discourse that had appeared in 2022 was too forced. He assessed that people need access to cheap staples in the midst of economic crushes compared to electrically based rice cooking tools.

"Why did it be forced to cancel last year? Isn't a budget like this being diverted to reduce/subsidy the price of rice," wrote Susi in her X account, @susipudjiastuti, Monday 9 October.

Even better, he continued, the government's budget for the free rice cooker program was replaced with cash whose impact would be more felt by the community to buy basic necessities such as rice.

"Or give it in cash value to help ease people's spending on their food needs?" he added.

Susi views that the transfer of how to cook so that people are busy using electrical technology has no urgency compared to meeting food needs. Mainly to erode stunting cases which are still a national problem.

"Last year the electric stove, now the rice cooker. Why don't you buy food? catfish get millions of kg, the protein can reduce stunting. Eggs are tens of millions of pills," he said.

Furthermore, Susi said the budget of hundreds of billions could also be used for other programs whose main goal remains to meet people's food needs rather than the availability of cooking utensils.

"Nelayan can get a thousand boats.. For fishing, you can get tons per year, house rehabilitation, public toilets," he said.