Government Review May Reduce Budget Requirement for Free Nutritious Meals Programme
Minister of State Secretary Prasetyo Hadi has revealed there is a possibility that the budget requirement for the Free Nutritious Meals (MBG) programme could decrease. However, he stressed that this does not mean the government will cut the programme’s funding allocation.
“It is not a cut. Based on the calculations, we believe there will be a reduction in the budget requirement for this free nutritious meal programme,” said Prasetyo after a ministerial-level coordination meeting on the implementation of the MBG programme at the Coordinating Ministry for Food office on Thursday, 11 June 2026.
According to Prasetyo, the government is currently reorganising the governance of the MBG programme, including recalculating its budget requirements. This process involves the National Nutrition Agency (BGN) as the programme manager and the Ministry of Finance.
He hopes the evaluation will yield more careful and accurate calculations. “We are therefore asking for time to also calculate with the Ministry of Finance and the BGN,” said Prasetyo.
The Gerindra Party politician explained that the results of this governance restructuring will later serve as the basis for determining the exact amount of funding truly needed to implement the MBG programme. Nonetheless, he has not yet disclosed the potential scale of the budget reduction or the factors being evaluated. “From this restructuring process, it will be possible to calculate more precisely how much budget is actually needed for this nutritious meal programme,” Prasetyo stated.
In 2026, the government allocated IDR 335 trillion for the MBG programme, though this amount was subsequently adjusted to IDR 268 trillion. The Ministry of Finance noted that the realised budget for the MBG programme up to 31 May 2026 had reached IDR 88.15 trillion. This figure represents an increase of 17.5 percent compared to the previous month’s realisation of IDR 75 trillion. By the end of May 2026, the MBG programme had reached 63.13 million beneficiaries, consisting of 48.9 million students and 14.3 million non-students. This achievement is a slight increase compared to April 2026, which recorded 62 million beneficiaries.