DEN Report Prabwo about MBG Impacts: Rising Student Study Spirit · Global Voices

Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia - the National Economic Council (DEN) gave President Prabowo Subianto's report, Tuesday (20 / 10 / 2026). In the meeting DEN gave a report regarding the impact of the free Bergizi Eating Program to the suggestion for distribution.

On that occasion there was the President DEN Luhut Binsar Panditan, Deputy Chief of DeN Mari Elka Pangestu, and the DEN members of Arief Anshory, Haryanto Adikoeeeemo, Taiwan Ensign, Mochamad Hidayat Word, and Septian Hario Seto.

Word has it there are some interesting findings in the execution of an MBG from the student's absence.

"In fact, it's quite large, especially in the poorest of them all. So when an MBG non-recipient, he will often be absent, while if an MBG recipient he will be relatively not absent from school," said the Word.

Later, the DEN also found the MBG recipient more eager in learning. That means the student quality level to absorb learning is better than the non-recipient.

"We also see his learning spirit is so, it turns out his mbg receptors are increasing, but there are conditions," he said.

He thinks the quality of the MBG program menu affects the spirit of learning. The record is 95% of the students who receive MBG say they're more excited when they get good quality menu.

"But indeed when the quality of the menu is ugly it drops very low that way. Which means that one of our recommendations to the president needs to be concerned with the quality of the MBG menu, because it correlates with the hunger and the passion of school children," his tour.

Furthermore, from this wide distribution of MBG per September's recipients is still concentrated in urban areas, rather than rural. Besides, there are still a lot of rich students who receive more than poor students.

"Which means that there need to be a better priority, especially for 3T areas, rural areas, and that poor people, because once again our studies show how the program is actually able to lower the absence of students to school and raise the spirit of learning and reduce hunger in school," the tour.