Minister Of Religion Explains 2023 Work Achievements, Including 2.3 Million Products Already Halal Certified

Minister of Religion Yaqut Cholil Qoumas. BETWEEN/HO-Kemenag.

Minister of Religion (Menag) Yaqut Cholil Qoumas explained the achievements of a number of work programs of the Ministry of Religion (Kemenag) throughout 2023.

"The program acceleration process can be carried out in line with digital transformation," said the Minister of Religion in a statement in Jakarta, Wednesday, December 27, which was confiscated by Antara.

He explained that digital transformation was marked by the launch of the Pusaka Superapps on November 25, 2022. The application was designed to integrate various service applications at the Ministry of Religion.

"Digital transformation is one of the seven priority programs of the Ministry of Religion. This is the foundation as well as an accelerator in achieving other programs at the Ministry of Religion," said the Minister of Religion.

Then for the priority program for the independence of Islamic Boarding Schools, he said, until now, there have been 2,076 Islamic boarding schools that have benefited from the business incubation program. In fact, he said, 128 of them have developed Islamic Boarding School Owned Enterprises (BUMPes).

In addition, 1,106 KUAs (Religious Affairs Offices) have been revitalized. KUA is now not only a matter of marriage registration, the role of KUA is optimized as a Center for Religious Services in order to improve the quality of people's religious life

Another priority program is Islamic Cyber University. It is noted that there have been 3,339 students from various regions in Indonesia who are facilitated by the Distance Education System (PJJ) at the Faculty of Tarbiyah Sciences and Sciences IAIN Syekh Nurjati Cirebon (Islamic Cyber University).

"They can still study from their area of origin, without having to leave their family and place of service. Next year, we will expand this program, not only Islamic Education programs, including opportunities for master's degree," said the Minister of Religion.

Three other priority programs related to each other, namely strengthening religious moderation, year of tolerance, and religious independence index. In general, the process of strengthening religious moderation is going well, although it is limited internally to the Ministry of Religion and other relevant stakeholders.

"The issuance of Presidential Decree No. 58 of 2023 concerning Strengthening Religious Moderation into a new chapter. In the future, MB strengthening can be carried out across K/L and local governments with the Ministry of Religion as its leading sector," he said.

In addition to priority programs, there are a number of achievements during 2023 that have become a positive legacy for the Ministry of Religion. This year, the target of one million halal certified products is exceeded. Until December 26, 2023, there were 2,395,905 products issued with halal certificates.

"The 2023 achievement is a very good foundation for the future. Since 2019, 3,488,069 products have been certified halal. I am sure there will be acceleration again in 2024," he said.

Another foundation is the success of the Ministry of Religion in organizing the 'Land-Friendly Hajj'. The Ministry of Religion has facilitated the departure of 61,536 elderly Hajj participants aged 65 years and over, and 5,791 people with disabilities.

The number of elderly pilgrims is the largest in the history of organizing the Indonesian pilgrimage or 29.3 percent of the total Indonesian pilgrims who arrived in the Holy Land, which was 209,782 people.

"This is a good legacy because in the next few years there will still be many elderly Indonesian pilgrims. For 2024, the number is estimated to reach 46 thousand," he concluded.