Revealed! This Is The Origin Of The IDR 300 Thousand BLT Cooking Oil Fund That Jokowi Gave To The Community

JAKARTA - President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) has officially announced the provision of direct cash assistance (BLT) to the community as compensation for the increase in cooking oil prices in the market.

In an announcement held last Friday, the Head of State emphasized that the government had determined the amount of BLT for cooking oil was IDR 300 thousand for each recipient for three months. The award is scheduled to be implemented in one distribution starting this April.

Meanwhile, the intended target is around 20.5 million people who are included in the list of recipients of non-cash food assistance and the family of hope program.

So where did the BLT funds for cooking oil come from?

In fact, this provision is one of the new initiatives in terms of social assistance which is different from the previous program.

Citing a report released by the Ministry of Finance, it was stated that the social assistance budget was included in the National Economic Recovery (PEN) scheme for the 2022 period, amounting to IDR 455.62 trillion.

The figures are then distributed into three main clusters. In detail, the first cluster is health care amounting to IDR 122.54 trillion which is used to continue the handling of COVID-19 and accelerate and expand vaccination in Indonesia.

Second, is the community protection cluster of IDR 154.76 trillion. It is in this second cluster that the BLT cooking oil budget originates. In addition, there are other programs focused aimed at maintaining the purchasing power of the poor and addressing extreme poverty.

Then the third cluster is strengthening economic recovery with a budget of IDR 178.32 trillion, which focuses on creating job opportunities and increasing productivity.

Meanwhile, the realization of PEN funds until March 25, 2022, was recorded at IDR 22.6 trillion, equivalent to 5 percent of the provided budget ceiling. In detail, the health cluster has absorbed IDR 800 billion, the community protection cluster IDR 21.2 trillion, and the economic strengthening cluster IDR 600 billion.

As previously reported, there is currently a spike in cooking oil prices due to the influence of global economic conditions which has made several important commodity prices soar. Previously, the government set the highest retail price (HET) for cooking oil at IDR 14,000 per liter through a subsidy mechanism for producers.

However, the scheme was not successful and resulted in a shortage of goods on the market. Thus, the government decided to release the price based on the demand-supply balance with the consequence that the price soared rapidly but was accompanied by the provision of BLT to the community as a cushion.