Funds promised to fight malnutrition

Funds promised to fight malnutrition

Rendi A. Witular, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government promised on Tuesday to allocate Rp 83.5 billion
(about US$8.7 million) in emergency funds to West and East Nusa
Tenggara to help resolve the malnutrition problem in the two
provinces.

Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Alwi Shihab said
the government would disburse Rp 37.5 billion to West Nusa
Tenggara and Rp 46 billion to East Nusa Tenggara within the next
10 days.

The funds would be spent on improving health facilities in the
two provinces and to buy emergency nutritional food for
malnourished children.

"The government will immediately disburse funds for
revitalizing health centers and buying nutritious foods," said
Alwi after a limited Cabinet meeting with Vice President Jusuf
Kalla.

Alwi said the funds would not be entirely taken from the
central government budgets, but also from local administrations
at the provincial and regional level.

Minister of Agriculture Anton Apriyantono, who also attended
the meeting, said the government would also distribute some 6.8
million cashew seeds, 60 tons of corn seeds, 91 tons of nut seeds
and 58 tons of green nut seeds for planting in a medium-term
program to ease the malnutrition problem.

The government will also distribute 5,500 cows to the area for
revitalizing the small and medium businesses in the two
provinces.

Anton will led the medium-term programs, while Alwi will be
responsible for dealing with short-term relief.

The government will also dispatch a team from the Ministry of
Public Works to increase water supplies and repair and create
irrigation systems in the two provinces to support agricultural
activities.

The malnutrition cases in the two rice-surplus provinces,
which made headlines nationwide, came to light in late April.

The incidence of malnutrition in the provinces was slightly
higher than the national rate with the number of infants annually
affected by malnutrition in the province estimated to be up to 10
percent of the total infant population in the province. The
national rate is 8 percent.