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South China Morning Post

Indonesia trims billions from free meals scheme after budget rethink

Indonesia has trimmed spending plans for what could still be the world's second-most expensive free meals programme, offering modest relief from fiscal pressures as President Prabowo Subianto advances a host of other big-ticket projects. Advertisement Planned spending on the programme, which targets reaching 83 million people in the coming months, was now forecast at 350 trillion rupiah (US$21.4 billion) next year after officials had revised ingredient cost estimates down by a third, said Dadan Hindayana, head of the newly created National Nutrition Agency. That marks a 22 per cent drop from spending plans earlier this year. This year's expenditures are expected to total about US$7.5 billion, Hindayana said in a recent interview. That represents a 29 per cent reduction from prior plans. The recalibration of the five-days-a-week programme, aimed at improving health outcomes for students, children under five, and pregnant or breastfeeding women in the world's fourth-most populous nation, could ease some investor concerns about Indonesia's budget deficit outlook as the president presses for big projects early in his presidency. Prabowo has backed consumer stimulus measures, started rolling out tens of thousands of new community co-operatives and floated plans for an US$80 billion sea wall off the north Java coast. Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto takes a closer look at the meals on offer during a visit to a school in Jakarta to inspect the free nutritious meals programme in May. Photo: Reuters Indonesia's free meals initiative could be the world's most expensive after the United States , which budgeted US$29.4 billion for meals in the school year ended 2023, according to the Global Child Nutrition Foundation, a Seattle-based non-profit that surveys such programmes. The third most expensive programme that year, at a little over US$10 billion, was in France