Jakarta. President Prabowo Subianto is seeking Brazil's advice as the launch date for his flagship free meal program nears.

The Prabowo government will begin distributing free and nutrient-rich meals to Indonesian students, starting with the elementary schoolers in January. As Indonesia only has less than two months before the program officially starts, the populous country wants to learn from Brazil’s experience of feeding tens of millions of students.

“I want to learn from Brazil which already has a successful program,” Prabowo told an Indonesia-Brazil business forum on the margins of the G20 talks in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday local time.

Prabowo was referring to Brazil’s National School Feeding Program (PNAE), which has earned the status of being one of the largest of its kind in the world. The PNAE feeds over 40 million students across Brazil with more than 50 million daily meals.

Prabowo has instructed his government officials to arrange an upcoming study with the Brazilian diplomatic mission in Indonesia. The ex-army general added: “We want to send a team to study Brazil’s meal program.”

According to Prabowo, Indonesia wants to feed its own people and save children from hunger. Prabowo even made another criticism of Indonesia's G20 status, saying that membership to the group of the world’s leading economies would be meaningless if the country still had many hungry children. He previously made a similar statement in his inaugural speech last month.

“What is the benefit of Indonesia being a G20 member when 20-25 percent of our children do not have enough to eat?” Prabowo told the Brazilian businesspeople.

The government has conducted trial tests to make sure that the program runs like a well-oiled machine. They have also released a timetable as to at what time would the kids get their meals. 

The Indonesian preschoolers would get their meal at 8 a.m. because they are only at school until 10 a.m. Elementary schools will distribute the meals to their students at 9 a.m. because they end their day at 12 a.m. Middle and high schoolers would have their lunch at 12 p.m. as they will have their lessons until between 2 and 4 p.m. The government has prepared to spend Rp 71 trillion ($4.5 billion) to fund the free meal program next year.

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