National Nutrition Agency Responds to Use of Rp 113 Billion to Pay Event Organiser

JAKARTA, KOMPAS.com - The National Nutrition Agency (BGN) has spoken out regarding the use of a Rp 113 billion budget to pay an Event Organiser (EO).

BGN Head Dadan Hindayana stated that involving an EO is a strategic necessity for the agency, which is still in the early stages of establishing its systems and operational governance.

“As a new institution formed to implement national strategic programmes, it is naturally in the initial phase of building systems, organisational structure, and operational governance,” said Dadan in his statement on Sunday (12/4/2026).

“In this stage, BGN does not yet have fully ready internal resources to handle all the needs of large-scale activities independently,” he added.

The EO is considered to possess expertise that BGN does not yet fully have.

“The use of EO services in this context is a strategic step to ensure that activities run professionally, to standard, and on time,” he said.

“EOs have special expertise in event management, from planning, vendor coordination, on-site technical management, to operational risk mitigation. These require experience and a solid team that realistically BGN does not yet fully possess in its early formation phase,” he added.

In addition to technical aspects, involving an EO is also seen as helping to organise administration and finance more neatly.

With a third party, procurement processes, vendor payments, and reporting can be carried out centrally and systematically.

He emphasised that the activities handled by the EO are not merely ceremonial, but part of the public communication strategy on national nutrition issues, including technical guidance (bimtek) for food handlers to ensure food security is managed by trained personnel.

“Therefore, the quality of implementation is crucial. The EO plays a role in ensuring that the messages the government wants to convey are packaged effectively, attractively, and with broad impact, so that programme objectives can be achieved optimally, as well as the management of trained human resources in their field,” he stressed.

From an efficiency perspective, using an EO is considered more rational than forming an internal team in a short time.

Building internal capacity requires a recruitment and training process that is not instantaneous, while the programmes must be implemented immediately.