Milk campaign aims to improve public health

Wahyoe Boediwardhana, The Jakarta Post, Denpasar

Puputan Badung Park in the middle of crowded Denpasar is an oasis for families living in the city.

Every Saturday and Sunday, hundreds of people flock to the park to breathe some relatively fresh air, and stroll and jog under the shady trees. Children happily run around, enjoying the open spaces.

On March 20, many more visitors than usual visited the park to take part in a special event to promote milk drinking.

Four-year-old Reza was eagerly pointing to a poster of Badminton star Ricky Soebagja, winner of an Olympic gold medal, who was holding a huge carton of fresh milk.

Reza's mother, Setyawati, rushed to the center of the park, where the event had just started.

"Where can I get that `Ricky Soebagja' milk for my son," she asked a member of the campaign organizing committee.

Milk was abundant that day, providing a rare opportunity for the park visitors to sample it.

Sports star promotes milk

Mignone N.B. Maramis Akiyama, communications director of PT Tetra Pak Indonesia, said that the company had provided 25,000 cartons of fresh milk to be handed out to children free of charge.

Ricky was in the crowd. His smile and vigorous campaigning attracted a lot of people to the milk counter. He has been named a special ambassador for the nation's milk campaign.

"I hope parents will encourage their children to drink enough milk in order to boost their physical and intellectual development. If they do so, the next generation of Indonesians will be healthier," Ricky said during the event.

The Denpasar campaign, he said, provided a good starting point to heighten people's awareness of the importance of drinking milk.

The milk campaign is been promoted by PT Tetra Pak, with support from other dairy firms, including Ultrajaya, Indomilk, Greenfields and Industri Susu Alam Murni.

The campaign road show will visit six large cities including Surabaya, East Java; Semarang, Central Java; Yogyakarta; Medan, North Sumatra; and Bandung, West Java. Denpasar was chosen as the first stop for the road show.

During a year-long nationwide campaign, PT Tetra Pak Indonesia plans to hand out 210,000 cartons of fresh milk to young children.

According to Mignone, Indonesia's milk consumption is low compared to other countries in Southeast Asia, particularly Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand.

Low consumption in Indonesia

Average annual milk consumption in Indonesia was only seven liters per person by the end of 2003, compared to Malaysia's 20 and Thailand's 21.

Indonesia's annual average milk consumption level increased slightly from only 5.10 liters per person in l998 (when the country was being hit hard by the economic crisis) to seven liters by the end of 2003.

Ali Khomsan, professor of nutrition at the Bogor Institute of Agriculture, commented that the increase in milk consumption had not been that significant.

"The trend is upward, but increasing only slowly," explained the professor.

He added that Indonesia lagged behind other nations in terms of consumption of milk and nutritious foods such as meat, eggs and other protein-rich items.

The people's nutritional status has been low, if not poor, over the last four decades.

In l970, average annual milk consumption was only 1.82 liters per capita. Ten years later, it had increased to 4.36 liters, and soared to 6.99 in 1995. It dropped back sharply to 5.10 liters in l998.

During the economic crisis in 1997 and l998, Indonesians consumed on average half a glass of milk per week, one egg and two slices of meat.

"This illustrates how poor our people's nutrition is. We cannot expect to excel as a well-fed nation when our consumption of protein-rich food and beverages is so low," said Professor Khomsan.

Mignone added that the majority of Indonesians still regarded milk as luxurious beverage. At a price of Rp 3,000 per liter, similar to the price of a kilogram of rice, consuming milk has become a second choice for many people, especially the poor.

"People first choose carbohydrate-rich food, ignoring its nutritional content. Many Indonesians stop drinking milk when they reach the age of six to seven," Mignone explained.

Relatively high cost

The professor added that the high price of milk in Indonesia was partly caused by our inefficient dairy industry.

The cows here originally came from subtropical countries. When they were raised in tropical countries like Indonesia, the animals could not produce as much milk as in their places of origin.

Moreover, our technology and agriculture system is still far behind those of the advanced countries.

The demand for fresh milk in Indonesia stood at 1,034.6 tons in 1998, and only one-third of the demand could be met by local producers; the rest was imported from various overseas countries.

That clearly explained why milk, to the present day, is still out of the reach of the majority of Indonesians.

Lactose intolerance

The second problem, the professor explained, is lactose intolerance. During their early years, babies and young children's bodies produce adequate quantities of the enzyme that enables them to process milk and other dairy products in their digestive systems.

As they grow older, the amount of this enzyme decreases, causing many people to suffer from a variety of health problems, including diarrhea, if they drink milk.

A study in the United States showed that consuming one to two cups of milk per day would not cause any health problems. For those who suffer lactose intolerance, drinking milk in appropriate quantities will enhance and train their bodies to accept a daily milk intake.

A person's daily calcium intake should be at least 800 mg to 1,200 mg, or the equivalent of three to four glasses of milk. In the United States, where milk is abundant and the milk-drinking habit well established, the average calcium intake is still inadequate.

Also in the United States, Professor Khomsam added, the contribution to calcium intake from dairy products is approximately 400 mg, or between 35 percent and 50 percent, while in Indonesia, people consume only about 20 mg of milk per day on average.

Nutrition programs in developed countries have always included milk as part of food supplement programs. School students in the United States receive free milk as part of the country's Special Milk program.

Infants, toddlers and pregnant women, especially those from low-income families, received 15 liters of milk a month.

In Indonesia, the United States Department of Agriculture has supported Indonesia's milk program by distributing free milk and soybean milk to 465,673 school students across the country between l999 and 2000.