JAKARTA - Saudi Arabia's Hajj Organizing Officers (PPIH) every hajj season remind Hajj services pilgrims to be stopped for three days due to very heavy traffic conditions and cooks have also been concentrated with Armina.
"The catering service in Mecca was temporarily suspended the day before the peak of the hajj and two days after Armina," said Chairman of PPIH Saudi Arabia 1444 H/2023 M Subhan Cholid in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, as reported by ANTARA, Sunday, June 18.
He explained, this year, PPIH provided congregational catering services while in Mecca 66 times in the form of breakfast, lunch and dinner.
According to Subhan Cholid, the policy of providing catering services from 2015 is inseparable from the policy changes imposed by the Government of Saudi Arabia.
Since 2015, catering has become one of the requirements in the implementation of hajj (e-hajj) electronics in addition to accommodation and transportation.
"In that seven-year span, the number of catering services in Mecca is not always the same every season," said Subhan Cholid.
In the first year of providing catering services in Mecca in 2015, Subhan said Indonesian pilgrims received 15 times of catering services distributed as lunch.
The service was provided since the first arrival of Indonesian pilgrims in Mecca, but six days before the peak of the catering service in Mecca was temporarily suspended and only opened after the peak of the hajj.
"So, for pilgrims who come to Mecca before the peak of the hajj, catering services are provided in the pre- and post-Armina phase," said Subhan.
In 2016, catering services were 24 times lunch and dinner and in 2017 increased to 25 times, namely lunch and dinner and the addition of one-time food for congregational breakfast.
Furthermore, in 2018 and 2019, catering services in Mecca were provided 40 times in the form of lunch and dinner.
Subhan said that from 2015 to 2019, there was always a temporary suspension of catering services ahead of and after the peak of the hajj, but the period of termination was different.
In 2015 the temporary suspension had even been carried out six days before the peak of the hajj, while in 2016 to 2019 the temporary suspension of catering services was carried out three days before the peak phase of the hajj.
The catering service in that period was only returned three days after the peak of the hajj or starting at 16 Zulhijjah.
Two reasons for stopping catering ahead and after the peak of the hajj, according to Subhan, are because all the world's pilgrims have been concentrated in Mecca ahead of the wusuf.
"Conditions like this make it difficult in the food distribution process because of the traffic density in the city of Mecca," said Subhan.
Another factor causing the cessation of catering for pilgrims, according to Subhan, is that the workforce of the catering service provider ahead of the peak of the hajj is also concentrated into kitchens in Armina because catering services are cooked in kitchens prepared in tents of Indonesian pilgrims in Arafah and Mina.
In 2022 or after two years of not organizing the pilgrimage with a number of worshipers below 50 percent of the normal quota and the post-pandemic condition of Mecca, the PPIH at the direction of the Minister of Religion Yaqut Cholil Qoumas provides full catering services.
"Indonesian pilgrims get 75 meals while in Mecca in the form of breakfast, lunch, and dinner," said Subhan.
This year, the quota for Indonesian pilgrims has returned to normal, and even received an additional 8,000 people, bringing the total to 229,000 pilgrims and the city of Mecca to be very congested and will continue to grow.
Ahead of the peak of the hajj, the total quota of pilgrims from all over the world is estimated to reach 2.5 million pilgrims so that Indonesian pilgrim catering services in Mecca are temporarily suspended the day before the peak of the hajj and two days after Armina.
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