PROGRAM Free Nutritious Meals (MBG) is one of the largest social policies in modern Indonesian history. This program not only provides food for students, pregnant women, and vulnerable groups, but is also designed as a long-term investment to build human resource quality towards Indonesia Gold 2045.
The government positions MBG as a strategic instrument to address stunting, improve education quality, strengthen food security, and boost regional economic growth.
However, it must be deconstructed that every large program always faces governance risks. When legal issues arise involving officials or program implementers, public attention often gets trapped on individuals and forgets the substance of the policy.
The former Head of the National Nutrition Agency (BGN), Dadan Hindayana, was officially detained by the Attorney General’s Office on Wednesday afternoon, June 3, 2026. He was detained along with two former deputies in connection with an alleged corruption case in the management of the Free Nutritious Meals program. The previous night, Dadan Hindayana had also been officially deactivated by President Prabowo Subianto.
The detention of Dadan Hindayana clearly presents an anticlimactic fact from the reality occurring in Indonesia today. In fact, if we look at the history of development in various developing countries, the success of national nutrition programs is not determined by specific figures, but by institutional strength, transparency, and public oversight.
Therefore, if a crisis of confidence occurs in the implementation of MBG, the solution needed is not program termination, but a push for comprehensive reform to save this strategic national program and return it to its sacred value.
Integrity Test
As the public, we certainly agree that the rule of law is the foundation of trust. In a state of law, enforcement against alleged budget deviations is part of the mechanism for protecting public interest.
Programs that manage large amounts of public funds must adhere to the principles of accountability, transparency, and strict oversight.
International experience shows that successful school meal programs are always built on a strong audit system. The main challenge is not only ensuring food reaches beneficiaries, but also ensuring that procurement, distribution, and reporting processes run transparently.
Legal reform in MBG should be directed towards digitizing the supply chain, opening beneficiary data, independent audits, and public participation in oversight.
Law enforcement against individuals suspected of violations should not be interpreted as program failure. On the contrary, this is evidence that the state’s oversight mechanisms are still working.
From an institutional perspective, the success of reform is determined by the state’s ability to separate personal issues from the program’s strategic goals.
In the realm of human capital investment, the MBG program should not only be seen as social spending, but must have a clear systemic thinking base with measurable state financial budget laws.
Debates about MBG often focus on the large budget. In fact, in development economics, nutrition programs are a form of human capital investment.
Various international studies show that school meal programs provide much greater economic benefits than the costs incurred.
World Bank studies and various global research show that school feeding programs increase school participation, improve nutritional status, enhance educational achievement, and generate social and economic benefits for local communities.
In fact, the economic benefits generated include increased long-term productivity, social protection, and strengthening of local agricultural economies, as explained in the study Rethinking School Feeding (World Bank, 2009). A more recent study, An Investment in Children’s Future (World Bank, 2025), also affirms that school meals are a human development investment that provides significant benefits for education, nutrition, and the economy.
School meal programs in developing countries have also been proven to create economic multiplier effects. When food ingredients are purchased from local farmers, local fishermen, and regional MSMEs, government funds circulate at the community level.
The World Bank notes that local food procurement in school meal programs can increase small farmers’ incomes and strengthen rural economies.
In the Indonesian context, MBG has the potential to become a very large regional economic development instrument. This program can connect the agricultural, livestock, fisheries, logistics, and MSME sectors in one national economic ecosystem.
The government itself assesses that MBG has an impact on increasing people’s purchasing power and local economic activity.
Therefore, MBG reform must focus on efficiency and governance, not on reducing program goals. What needs to be improved is the implementation mechanism, not the vision of human development
