Big Challenges Of The National Nutrition Agency, More Than Just Fulfilling Campaign Promises

President Joko Widodo shook the head of the Dadan Hindayana National Nutrition Agency witnessed by the Head of the Taruna Ikrar BPOM after the inauguration at the State Palace, Jakarta, Monday (19/8/2024). (ANTARA/Sigid Kurniawan/rwa)

JAKARTA The decision of President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) to form the National Nutrition Agency has attracted the attention of many parties, because the term of service is only two months away. The formation of this agency cannot be separated from the free nutritious eating program which is the flagship program of the elected president and vice president, Prabowo Subianto-Gibran Rakabuming Raka.

Monday (19/8/2024), Jokowi not only announced the reshuffle or reshuffle of several ministers, but also announced two new institutions, including the National Nutrition Agency. Citing the website of the Cabinet Secretariat of the Republic of Indonesia, the National Nutrition Agency is a government institution formed based on Presidential Regulation (Perpres) Number 83 of 2024.

President Jokowi appointed a lecturer at the Bogor Agricultural Institute (IPB) Dadan Hindayana as Head of the National Nutrition Agency. Referring to the Presidential Decree, the main task of the National Nutrition Agency is to meet national nutrition.

It's nothing, this body has been faced with a big challenge, as well as the assumption that this formation includes an effort to'share cakes' for close people who support Prabowo-Gibran.

The free nutritious dining program, previously known as free lunch, is a flagship program since the campaign period of Prabowo Subianto-Gibran Rakabuming Raka. Therefore, when both of them succeeded in becoming president and vice president-elect period 2024-2029, this program immediately received the spotlight.

Some people are skeptical of this program, because it will suck up a very large budget. But the Prabowo-Gibran camp did not budge, and ensured that this program was seriously worked on. The establishment of the National Nutrition Agency is one of the efforts to realize the free nutritious eating program as planned.

Dadan said the free nutritious food program would reach 82.9 million beneficiaries, including pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers, toddlers, and school children from PAUD to SMA, as well as religious schools.

"He (President Jokowi-ed) wants the Nutrition Agency not only to implement the Free Nutrition Food Program for school children, but more broad than that, especially the culture of living a healthy life," Dadan said at the Presidential Palace complex, Jakarta, Tuesday (20/8/2024) as reported by Antara.

For this free nutritious dining program, the Minister of Finance (Menkeu) Sri Mulyani has allocated a budget of IDR 71 trillion in the 2025 RAPBN. Trials on free nutritious food programs also continue to be carried out in schools in various regions as an evaluation of program readiness.

With the existence of the National Nutrition Agency and a free nutritious trial, the public hopes that this program will be able to pay off campaign promises, namely the fulfillment of national nutrition.

Despite the public's doubts about the free nutritious eating program, this program actually has a good and a bad side.

Prabowo wants to make sure students receive at least one nutritious meal in a day. In general, nutritional adequacy is important for the cognitive development of children and their overall health. By reducing hunger, this program is expected to help reduce the level of malnutrition and stunting among children.

According to the Indonesian Nutrition Status Survey (SSGI), Indonesia's stunting prevalence has decreased from 24.4 percent in 2021 to 21.6 percent in 2022. But that figure is still far from the government's target of wanting to be at 14 percent this year. Meanwhile, the standard for World Health Organization (WHO) stunting prevalence should be less than 20 percent.

By gaining good food intake, the chances of children growing both physically and successfully academically are greater.

In addition, this program also helps ensure that all students can gain access to nutritious food. The same menu for all in one school also encourages equality from different backgrounds.

But free nutritious eating programs have big challenges, among which the most often discussed are the jumbo budget, as well as how to distribute food.

Another challenge for the National Nutrition Agency is the scarcity of food that is still happening in several regions. In addition, the problem of safe and nutritious food quality is still not evenly distributed.

Eliza Mardian of the Center of Reform on Economic (CORE) said the National Nutrition Agency had challenges on how to make effective and useful use of the Rp71 trillion budget. She hopes that this program will not only fulfill nutrition, but also a means of achieving food diversification.

National Nutrition Agency programs must be able to promote food diversification based on local commodities, thereby increasing public awareness of nutrition.

"The use of corn, sorghum, cassava, and alternative protein such as fish or local chickens can reduce dependence on imports, as well as encourage national food independence," said Eliza.

Therefore, Eliza reminded that the problem of fulfilling nutrition is not only related to the nutrition sector, but also intersecting with the agricultural and educational sectors. The National Nutrition Agency is expected to be a better coordination facilitator of the relevant ministries or institutions.

If the National Nutrition Agency plans a program to improve nutrition but is not supported by the agricultural sector as its food provider, then improving nutrition according to the local context will not be achieved. Therefore, a comprehensive strategy is needed and all ministries or institutions have the same goals," Eliza's message.

Meanwhile, Associate Professor Public Health Monash University Indonesia, Grace Wangge hopes that the National Nutrition Agency cannot intervene with bad industry personnel, especially those who force high-products of sugar-garmage (GGL). Grace explained that GGL's high-food products not only damage the diet, but also disrupt the health of children in the future.

The formation of the National Nutrition Agency is also a concern of Economists from the Center of Economic and Law Studies (Celios) Nailul Huda. He predicted that the adaptation of the National Nutrition Agency would take quite a long time to be effective. Within four months, Huda said, it was very short to prepare the organization as well as the program running in early 2025.

"The Rp71 trillion budget is a large budget and the National Nutrition Agency has a big responsibility to implement a free nutritious food program," Huda told VOI.

"I don't think it's good to take a budget from IDR 71 trillion for agency operations. It should be outside of that. Or the easiest thing is to revoke the nutrition dichotocrat at the Ministry of Health so that the program can immediately reverse because it has formed a work pattern," he added.

Furthermore, according to Nailul Huda's assessment, the formation of the National Nutrition Agency is also an event for division of positions, considering that Dadan is none other than the Prabowo-Gibran team in yesterday's presidential election.

Prior to this, there were accusations that President Jokowi distributed positions to close people and supporters of Prabowo-Gibran. This is because a number of names in the ranks of the Prabowo-Gibran team accepted strategic positions such as Felicity Tallulembang, NasDem Party politician who was appointed commissioner of Bank Syariah Indonesia last May, to PSI politician Grace Natalie who was appointed as special staff to the president and commissioner of MIND ID.

In addition, because the formation of the National Nutrition Agency is only contained in the Presidential Decree, the agency has the potential to be dissolved at any time.

"I think if it is not effective, it is better to dissolve the national nutrition agency. The free nutritious eating program is handed over to the Ministry of Social Affairs and used as a social assistance program," Huda suggested.