Minister of State Secretary (Mensesneg), Prasetyo Hadi, has hinted at the government’s decision to save the 2025 state budget (APBN) for the sake of increasing funding for the free nutritious meals program (MBG).
President Prabowo Subianto previously decided to cut the budget of Ministries and Regional Governments (Pemda) by Rp306.69 trillion (US$18.9 billion). This APBN cut is a consequence of the implementation of the president’s priority programs.
“MBG is already underway, but the president feels that as soon as possible, the beneficiaries will be more numerous and more evenly distributed,” Prasetyo said on Thursday, January 23, 2025.
President Prabowo is targeting total budget savings of Rp306.69 trillion, with details of budget cuts to ministries and institutions amounting to Rp256.1 trillion, and from funds transferred to regions amounting to Rp50.59 trillion.
This instruction is stated in Presidential Instruction (Inpres) No. 1/2025on Spending Efficiency in the Implementation of the 2025 State Budget and Regional Budget.
Prabowo asked ministers and heads of institutions to identify spending efficiency plans according to the direction of the Minister of Finance. These savings include operational and non-operational spending, including office spending, maintenance, service spending, government assistance, infrastructure development, and procurement of equipment and machinery.
Prasetyo said the measure to accelerate the distribution of MBG to all school-age children in Indonesia has implications for the need to increase the budget.
“Of course there are consequences that may require additional costs, so from the savings we made yesterday, there is a possibility that it will also be prioritized for the MBG program,” he said.
Prabowo is committed to accelerating the target of distributing MBG to all school-age children by the end of 2025. He is gradually targeting 3 million school children receiving MBG for the January-April period.
The target will gradually increase to 6 million children in April-August and 15 million children by September 2025. Furthermore, all Indonesian children will be able to obtain MBG by the end of 2025.
Additionally, the total target for MBG recipients of 82.9 million people is actually a long-term target that will be implemented gradually until 2029.
