Coordinating Minister for Food: Family is the Foundation for Achieving National Food Security

Coordinating Minister for Food and Agriculture, Zulkifli Hasan. (Special)

JAKARTA - Coordinating Minister for Food Zulkifli Hasan emphasized that the family is the main foundation in realizing national food security. According to him, strengthening the family is the key to ensuring that the community has access to safe, nutritious, and affordable food.

The statement was made while attending the 109th Milad 'Aisyiyah Humanitarian Dakwah Jamboree in Tawangmangu, Karanganyar Regency, Central Java, which coincided with the National Family Day.

Zulhas (nickname) said food security not only talks about the availability of food ingredients, but also how each family is able to obtain decent food to support quality of life.

"Food security is not only about availability, but also ensuring that people have access to safe, nutritious, and affordable food," he said in an official statement, Sunday, June 28.

To answer the challenges of stunting and extreme poverty, he continued, the government continues to carry out various programs that integrate nutritional fulfillment with community economic empowerment. One of them is through the Free Nutritious Meal (MBG) Program.

According to Zulhas, the program is not only aimed at improving the nutritional quality of children, pregnant women, and breastfeeding mothers, but also encouraging economic circulation in the region through the involvement of farmers, livestock farmers, fishermen, cooperatives, micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs), and food business actors.

He assessed that the National Family Day commemoration was an opportunity to strengthen collaboration between the government and Aisyiyah Central Java in building a strong family while accelerating the reduction of stunting rates, reducing extreme poverty, and strengthening national food security.

"It is hoped that this synergy will continue to be strengthened through various community empowerment programs. So that humanitarian preaching which is realized through family strengthening and nutritional fulfillment can bring a more peaceful, healthy, and prosperous community life," he said.