Free meals and food poisoning: what Indonesia's official counts show

Indonesia's free meals programme, Makan Bergizi Gratis (MBG), reached 62,964,716 beneficiaries by 1 June 2026, according to the National Nutrition Agency (BGN). Over the same period the agency's own figures on suspected food poisoning grew from more than 6,457 people affected in the first nine months of 2025 to 29,028 children treated as outpatients and 2,413 hospitalised as of 1 June 2026, Kompas TV reported.

Those numbers come from different counting methods and different speakers, and they do not form a single continuous series. Read together, they show a programme that expanded quickly, a poisoning problem that the agency itself has repeatedly acknowledged before the House of Representatives, and a set of enforcement steps that grew stricter over 2026. This analysis sets out the official figures in the order they were released, the agency's response, the claims about the programme that fact checkers have tested, and what to watch as the 2027 budget is settled. It draws on the records kept on our issue page, Food poisoning in the Free Nutritious Meals programme.

The official counts, release by release

October 2025. The then head of BGN, Dadan Hindayana, told House Commission IX on 1 October 2025 that more than 6,457 people had been affected by MBG-linked food poisoning from January to September 2025, Metro TV reported. He counted about 24 incidents from 6 January to 31 July and 51 incidents from 1 August onward. Java accounted for the largest share of victims, with 4,147, followed by Sumatra with 1,307 and eastern Indonesia with 1,003.

November 2025. At a Commission IX hearing on 12 November 2025, Dadan said MBG accounted for 211 of 441 food poisoning incidents recorded nationwide, or about 48 percent, Detik reported. He presented two sets of numbers. BGN recorded 636 people hospitalised and 11,004 treated as outpatients. Ministry of Health data showed 13,371 beneficiaries with health problems, including 638 hospitalised and 12,755 outpatients. The agency said it would reconcile the two.

June 2026. In a progress report as of 1 June 2026, BGN put suspected poisoning at 29,028 children treated as outpatients and 2,413 hospitalised, Kompas TV reported. The agency expressed these as 0.046 percent and 0.0038 percent of beneficiaries. The same report said 8.5 billion portions had been served since 6 January 2025.

September 2026. Sudaryono, who has headed BGN since 22 July 2026, told Commission IX on 3 September 2026 that 5,482 people had been affected in 71 incidents since he took office, linked to 62 kitchens, Katadata reported. Java and Madura accounted for 45 incidents and 3,799 people. He said more than 80 percent of the cases stemmed from breaches of standard operating procedures.

How the agency responded

The agency's main tool has been the kitchen itself. MBG meals are cooked in local service units known as SPPG. In October 2025 Dadan said kitchens found negligent were closed temporarily with no fixed end date, until the operator made improvements and the investigation concluded, Metro TV reported. He described the typical breaches: raw ingredients bought four days ahead when the rule allows two, and meals cooked at 9am but dispatched only at noon, with some taking more than 12 hours to reach pupils.

By the end of May 2026, BGN had suspended operations at 995 kitchens and issued 367 first warnings and 16 second warnings, according to its 1 June progress report cited by Kompas TV.

In August 2026 the rules changed. After a leadership meeting on 3 August, Sudaryono said BGN would no longer treat poisoning as a "notable incident" but as a "fatal incident", RRI reported. Under that status, the kitchen involved is suspended first and its head is removed from post while BGN investigates with the local health office. Depending on the findings, further sanctions could include dismissal or the loss of contract status, he said. The term "fatal incident" describes the severity of the response; the RRI report did not define it further.

By early September, 38 kitchens in Java and Madura had been temporarily closed, and the 12 Sumatran kitchens linked to incidents remained shut, Katadata reported. Sudaryono identified a mismatch between kitchen capacity and the number of beneficiaries as the main cause, with 27,022 kitchens active. BGN said delivery vehicles must reach schools before the consumption deadline and uneaten food must be withdrawn. Sudaryono also said that where negligence with a criminal element was identified, the agency could not protect those responsible.

Checked claims about the programme

The programme has also attracted claims that fact checkers have tested. All are recorded on our claims page.

• In his 14 August 2026 state address, President Prabowo Subianto said one in four Indonesian children is stunted. Kompas.com rated this misleading: the latest national survey, SSGI 2024, put stunting at 19.8 percent, roughly one in five.
• Posts in December 2025 said Finance Minister Purbaya Yudhi Sadewa had asked the president to convert MBG into cash of Rp300,000 per pupil a month. Kompas.com rated this false; the Finance Ministry denied any such proposal.
• Posts in June 2026 said the president had abolished MBG and replaced it with cash. Kompas.com rated this a hoax, noting it had debunked versions of the claim repeatedly since late 2025.
• A video in August 2026 claimed 800 state enterprises would be closed to fund MBG. ANTARA rated it a hoax: the government is consolidating state enterprises, but there is no official link to the meals programme.

Our earlier fact check, Fake quotes, AI photos and old videos: Indonesia's political hoaxes of 2026, covers these alongside other political claims.

What the record shows

• BGN and the Ministry of Health have both published poisoning figures, and in November 2025 they did not match exactly.
• The agency has consistently attributed most cases to breaches of its own operating procedures, in October 2025 and again in September 2026.
• Enforcement moved from open-ended suspensions in 2025 to automatic suspension and removal of kitchen heads from August 2026.
• The scale is large in absolute terms: by June 2026, more than 31,000 children had been treated after suspected MBG poisoning by the agency's count, even though BGN expresses the figure as a small share of beneficiaries.

What remains open

There is no single public dataset that tracks incidents, people affected and kitchen sanctions over time using one method. The figures above were given at hearings or in progress reports, and each uses a different period. The sources reviewed for this analysis do not report deaths. It is also not public how many suspended kitchens have reopened, or what the investigations under the August 2026 "fatal incident" rules have found.

What to watch

The 2027 budget. On 3 September 2026 Sudaryono presented BGN's 2027 work plan to Commission IX with a budget ceiling of Rp240.20 trillion, about Rp30 trillion below the indicative ceiling of Rp270.20 trillion, InfoPublik reported. Of that, Rp232.50 trillion is for MBG, with a target of 72,464,886 beneficiaries. Lawmakers will decide how much of that goes to food safety, inspection and kitchen certification.

Oversight. Commission IX hearings have been the main place where poisoning figures are disclosed. Whether BGN publishes regular incident data, and whether the Ministry of Health and BGN figures are reconciled, will show how much outside scrutiny the programme receives.

Accountability. Watch for the outcome of investigations into suspended kitchens and whether any case goes beyond administrative sanctions. We track officials' formal records in the officials directory and links between institutions on the intelligence page.