MBG Program: A “Successful Failure”

Prabowo Subianto’s Free Nutritious Meal (MBG) program looks increasingly spectacular on paper. Launched in January 2025, it already claims over 44 million beneficiaries, making it, in the President’s words, “one of the fastest and largest achievements in the world.” This is significantly different compared to Brazil that reportedly needed around 11 years to reach a similar scale.

Yet this rapid rise in number is precisely what exposes its shortcomings. MBG is expanding at a pace that exceeds the institutional readiness needed to run it safely and effectively.

What MBG currently embodies is a familiar trap in development policy: the replication of a success example in form without the underlying function. The “isomorphic mimicry” concept as famously articulated by Lant Pritchett refers to the ways in which governments imitate models that look successful, but they fail to build the institutional capacity that underpins real success. The result, Pritchett argues, is often a “technique of successful failure.”

In the case of MBG, the program’s rushed rollout and reliance on sporadic centralized kitchens without clear program governance show a program designed to look successful, not to succeed.

This is not just a theoretical warning. Over 11,000 children reportedly suffered food poisoning between January and November 2025. Investigations pointed to poor hygiene, delayed delivery, and unsafe storage as major contributing factors. Many affected kitchens had operated for less than a month and lacked proper sanitation certification. Authorities have shut down dozens of the centralized kitchen operators (SPPGs), largely a reaction to public pressure because of the increasing food poisoning cases. There are also continuing reports about the presence of ultraprocessed foods in MBG, which can negatively impact healthy diets behaviour.

What makes these failures more alarming is how they diverge from the successes of other school-feeding models worldwide. Similar school meal programs have provided evidence of benefits, especially for disadvantaged groups when implemented effectively. In India’s Mid-Day Meal Scheme (MDMS), for instance, local governments established school-based kitchens, adapted menus, and oversaw daily implementation before the national government codified the program through the 2013 National Food Security Act. Brazil’s National School Feeding Programme (PNAE) followed a similar trajectory: what began as a centralized initiative was gradually decentralized and empowered municipalities and school-level councils to procure food, monitor quality, and even audit spending. In both countries, national expansion came after governance, capacity, and local accountability structures were solidified, not before.

In contrast, MBG remains top-down and dominated by centralized kitchens. This practice is not common globally. China, for example, started through pilot programs and established readiness by building the food environment and infrastructure at schools. Compared to countries with sustaining school meal programs, local actors’ involvement in Indonesia are much more limited. There is no clear, unified regulation (for example, no comprehensive presidential regulation), especially that regulated for wider stakeholders’ participation. It has also caused the lack of clarity on the accountability mechanisms and food-safety standards enforcement since the start. Instead, the government seemed to seek a shortcut by forming a national task force on MBG composed only of central government agencies in late October 2025.

To correct this trajectory, Indonesia needs a paradigm shift in thinking. MBG must move beyond counting heads and build the governance framework that will sustain the program. The rushed expansion has indicated impact ineffectiveness for a program that is shaky at best.

The government should transition from the current centralized model toward a decentralized framework with clear roles, accountability, and targeting mechanisms. This can be formalized through the presidential regulation on MBG that is already planned since early 2025 to be enacted sometime this year.

Implementation models must also be diversified. Instead of relying almost entirely on centralized SPPGs, MBG should support school-based kitchens and community-based models. This diversification would reduce risk, allow for more localized oversight, and foster community ownership.

Expansion should also be gradual and start with strategic targeting. Rather than pushing for universal reach at once, priority should go to the most vulnerable regions, particularly those with high stunting rates, limited infrastructure, or weak institutional capacity. Gradual expansion and multiple implementation models also allow the process of differentiated approach between regions with different contexts. For example, prioritizing building school kitchens and healthy food environments in areas with ready supporting infrastructure. At the same time, local stakeholders such as school committees, parent groups, educators, and civil society should be invited into governance structures, as practiced in Brazil, to implement or monitor the program.

Another critical dimension is food procurement. MBG procurement should be used to support domestic farmers, particularly smallholders, and to encourage healthier, minimally processed foods. This approach would align the program with Indonesia’s broader food-systems goals. The government must also strengthen its monitoring and evaluation. Regular public reporting on poisoning incidents, certification rates, kitchen inspections, and beneficiary feedback should become standard practice.

Indonesia does not need a school meal program that only looks ambitious on paper. It needs one that actually works. Unless Prabowo redirects MBG toward building a solid program design, empowering local institutions, and expanding gradually, the policy will continue to deliver scale without substance.

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