Vol. 18 No. 1 (2026)

The Free Nutritious Meal Program (MBG) is a policy intervention aimed at meeting nutritional needs, including those of schoolchildren. However, its implementation practices at the school suggest a pedagogical dimension that could strengthen the program’s objectives by fostering consumption habits and awareness. This study aims to analyze how nutrition literacy functions as a reinforcing mechanism of MBG at the primary school level. The research employs a qualitative approach with a case study design in a public primary school in East Java, using semi-structured interviews with six teachers and 27 students, observations of MBG practices, and document analysis. Data analysis employed thematic analysis to identify patterns of practice, socio-pedagogical relations, and mechanisms emerging from everyday interactions. The results showed that nutrition literacy has developed implicitly through shared eating experiences, teacher-student interactions, and the habituation of consumption, yet remains excluded from the formal curriculum. The strengthening of MBG does not occur solely through policy design, but also through relational dynamics among teachers, students, and food consumption experiences that shape school-level mechanisms. These findings affirm that schools function as nodes for translating the policy into students’ concrete learning experiences, thereby positioning nutrition literacy as an emergent mechanism and practical medium for reinforcing the MBG program rather than merely a knowledge output. This study provides empirical contributions regarding the importance of a school practice-based approach in formulating strategies to strengthen MBG.

This study examines coordination between schools and the Nutrition Food Production Center (SPPG) in implementing Indonesia’s Free Nutritious Meal Program (MBG) in Bojonegoro Regency, East Java, across schools with diverse operational capacities. This study uses integrated qualitative methods by highlighting governance processes—role allocation, communication flows, decision-making, and reporting—rather than impact indicators. Data were generated through purposive focus group discussions with school principals, teacher MBG coordinators, SPPG managers and operational staff, and school committee representatives or parents, and triangulated with relevant program documents. Transcripts were analyzed thematically using iterative coding. Findings show coordination is mainly operational and weakly institutionalized: schools act as passive recipients, while SPPG controls menu selection, production, and logistics, yielding asymmetric, largely one way information exchange. Communication and problem reporting rely on informal messaging and brief delivery-time interactions, with limited documentation, unclear pathways, and inconsistent feedback. These governance gaps contribute to recurring delivery delays, unannounced menu changes, inadequate accommodation for dietary restrictions, and increased administrative workload for schools. They also intensify parental concerns regarding food quality and safety and influence student acceptance, thereby undermining program legitimacy. The study concludes that implementation quality depends on strengthening local coordination capacity through regular coordination forums, standardized reporting and feedback protocols, clearer role and accountability structures, and ongoing technical support aligning centralized standards with context-sensitive adaptation. Institutionalizing coordination would enable the school SPPG network to transition from reactive delivery to continuous improvement, supporting transparent learning, effective risk management, and sustained community buy-in over time.

Regional financial management in Indonesia necessitates comprehensive transparency, accountability, and integration, driven by the mandate to implement the Regional Government Information System (SIPD). Although the policy architecture has been established nationally, its execution at the provincial level indicates significant asymmetric disparities. This study evaluates the implementation and administration of regional finances through the SIPD platform in three provinces—West Java, Banten, and Jambi—which represent high, moderate, and low-performance clusters, respectively. Employing a descriptive qualitative approach predicated on the Context, Input, Process, Product (CIPP) evaluation model, data were collected through in-depth interviews, participant observation, and document analysis. The findings indicate that the aggregate implementation of SIPD has not yet achieved an optimal level. Contextually, the policy is highly congruent with the regional urgency for a single data architecture. However, the input evaluation reveals a severe gap regarding human resource competencies and digital infrastructure. The process evaluation highlights crucial technical impediments, encompassing shadow manual procedures, double-entry bookkeeping practices, and Application Programming Interface (API) synchronization failures, particularly in Banten and Jambi, whereas West Java demonstrates precise alignment between planning and budgeting. The product evaluation illustrates an uneven distribution of benefits; West Java achieved profound transparency with efficient disbursements, while Jambi and Banten continue to struggle with administrative inconsistencies. Central government interventions via technical guidance and iterative system updates have mitigated several constraints but necessitate more targeted intensification. This study concludes that the standardization of business processes, enhancement of technical infrastructure, and sustainable development of human capital are strategic imperatives for optimizing SIPD and actualizing accountable regional financial governance.

This study aims to analyze the legal status, selection mechanism, and legal protection of employees of the Nutrition Fulfilment Service Unit (Satuan Pelayanan Pemenuhan Gizi/SPPG) who are appointed as Government Employees with Work Agreements (Pegawai Pemerintah dengan Perjanjian Kerja/PPPK) within the Indonesian civil service system. This study used a normative legal research method, drawing on statutory, conceptual, and case approaches. This study examines relevant regulations governing the Free Nutritious Meals Program and the State Civil Apparatus system. The results show that, formally, SPPG employees appointed as PPPK have a legitimate legal basis under the prevailing laws and regulations. However, there are normative ambiguities regarding the criteria for eligible employees, the classification of positions within the civil service structure, and the absence of clear, standardized selection mechanisms based on the merit system. Furthermore, several issues related to legal certainty persist, including unclear parameters for contract renewal, potential discretion in performance evaluation, legal risks arising from operational activities, and the lack of comprehensive administrative and judicial remedies in employment disputes. These conditions indicate that although the policy is legally recognized, its implementation has not fully reflected the principles of meritocracy, legal certainty, and integrated civil service management. Therefore, more detailed implementing regulations are required to ensure transparent recruitment, objective evaluation, and adequate legal protection for SPPG employees as PPPK.

The Free Nutritious Meal (Makan Bergizi Gratis [MBG]) program is a strategic government policy introduced under President Prabowo Subianto of Indonesia, aimed at improving children's nutritional status, reducing stunting, and strengthening human resource quality. Although the benefits of school feeding programs are well established globally, comprehensive studies on the effectiveness of the MBG program within Indonesia's regulatory and institutional capacity context remain limited. This article analyzes the MBG program using an evidence-based public policy approach and a political economy lens, drawing on a review of Scopus-indexed international journal articles, academic books, and the national regulatory framework. The analysis indicates that school feeding programs have positive effects on children's nutritional status, school attendance, and learning outcomes; however, their effectiveness is strongly influenced by governance quality, food safety, cross-sectoral coordination, and fiscal sustainability. In light of these findings, this article argues that the MBG program holds considerable potential as a transformational policy. Nonetheless, without sound fiscal design, strengthened institutional capacity, and robust public accountability mechanisms, the policy risks becoming a costly and unsustainable populist intervention.

Indonesia’s Free Nutritious Meal Program (Makan Bergizi Gratis, MBG), mandated under Presidential Regulation No. 115/2025, is designed to reduce child malnutrition through decentralized implementation. This study examines whether village governance readiness and environmental degradation are associated with severe malnutrition events, which are rare but operationally important for program targeting. Villages are used as the unit of analysis because they are the primary frontline setting for coordination, community monitoring, service responsiveness, and environmental exposure. Using administrative data from 2,876 villages, the study estimates event occurrence using a logit model and event burden using a negative binomial model. The stable negative binomial count model, retained after fuller specifications showed convergence and collinearity problems, indicates that governance readiness is positively associated with severe malnutrition burden but not statistically significant, whereas environmental conditions, service support, and poverty remain relevant to interpretation and targeting. These findings support a risk-informed MBG strategy that integrates service readiness, social vulnerability, and environmental conditions rather than relying solely on reported cases.

This study analyzes the media construction of the Free Nutritious Meal (MBG) program’s objectives in online news coverage through the lens of agenda-setting theory. It emphasizes three main dimensions—object salience, attribute salience, and actor salience—to understand how the media shapes issue priorities, policy interpretations, and the dominant voices in public discourse. Using a descriptive qualitative case study design, 150 articles from Kompas.com, Detik.com, and Tempo.co were analyzed via NVivo 15. The results indicate that coverage is dominated by objectives related to nutritional intake and stunting reduction (42.01%); while other objectives, such as food security and economic growth, receive significantly less attention. At the attribute level, the media frames the MBG program primarily as a nutrition-based intervention for vulnerable groups, marginalizing other development dimensions. At the actor level, discourse is dominated by state entities—specifically the National Nutrition Agency (BGN) and various ministries—reflecting a state-centered agenda. These findings highlight the need to position the MBG program as a cross-sectoral policy and strengthen inclusive public communication.

The Free Nutritious Meal (Makan Bergizi Gratis) program is a strategic national policy for strengthening human capital in Indonesia; however, its implementation is subject to significant fiscal and governance risks arising from the complexity of decentralized supply chains. This study aims to develop an integrated fraud prevention model, termed Smart-Nutri Governance, by combining digital governance architecture with continuous auditing mechanisms. This study employs a design-based policy research approach, using regulatory gap analysis and comparative policy analysis against India's Mid-Day Meal Scheme (Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman) and Brazil's National School Feeding Program (Programa Nacional de Alimentação Escolar). The analysis identifies three critical governance gaps: data validity (ghost recipients), price volatility, and audit detection lag. A simulation using West Java Province data estimates potential fiscal losses of up to 1.15 trillion Indonesian rupiah per year due to inefficiencies in beneficiary validation. To address these gaps, this study proposes a three-layer digital control architecture: (1) real-time biometric or QR-based validation at the point of service, (2) mandatory e-marketplace procurement to ensure price transparency and audit trails, and (3) artificial intelligence–based continuous auditing for real-time anomaly detection. The findings indicate that this model is projected to enhance control effectiveness and offer greater supervisory value compared to conventional post-audit approaches. This study contributes theoretically by integrating Fraud Diamond Theory with digital governance and continuous auditing in the public sector context. Practically, it provides an applicable and adaptive policy framework for strengthening financial accountability in large-scale social assistance programs.

The legal model governing the financing of a unique form of cooperative management in Indonesia under Article 33 of the 1945 Constitution requires further clarification. According to this management model, the state should remain present in and support cooperatives as pillars of the national economy. The administration of President Prabowo Subianto has developed this cooperative management model through the establishment of more than 83,000 Red-and-White Rural/Urban Village Cooperatives (Koperasi Desa/Kelurahan Merah Putih [KDKMPs]) throughout Indonesia, utilizing digital transformation to strengthen transparency, accountability, and sustainability in modern cooperative management. This study adopts a normative legal methodology supported by an empirical approach. Legislation, interview findings, focus group discussions, and materials from national seminars were collected, analyzed, and interpreted. The study finds that the KDKMP financing legal model is characterized by state intervention through the government’s direct financing of cooperatives using the state budget through state-owned banks as an implementation of constitutional economic principles concerning economic democracy and collective welfare.

This study analyzes the legal responsibility of organizers of the Free Nutritious Meal (MBG) program in Indonesia following nationwide mass poisoning incidents subsequent to its 2025 rollout. It examines weaknesses in food safety oversight, operational compliance, and access to remedies for affected students who lack direct contractual relations with implementing entities. The study aims to determine whether students qualify as intended third-party beneficiaries and to identify the civil liability applicable to the National Nutrition Agency (BGN) and its implementing units. This study employs a normative legal research method using deductive reasoning and combines statutory analysis with literature review. Sources include legislation, academic literature, incident reports, laboratory findings, and program documents collected through systematic library research. The analysis connects legal provisions with empirical evidence to assess coherence between law in books and law in action and to identify normative gaps. The findings indicate that students affected by MBG-related food poisoning incidents may be recognized as intended third-party beneficiaries under Article 1317 of the Civil Code and related constitutional and food safety norms. However, Presidential Regulation No. 115 of 2025 is primarily administrative and lacks explicit provisions on liability attribution compensation mechanisms insurance obligations and mandatory recall procedures. The study concludes that the recognition of beneficiary status must be accompanied by regulatory reform and institutional redesign. It recommends revising Presidential Regulation No. 115 of 2025 to define civil liability rules require compulsory liability insurance create a temporary compensation fund and establish a centralized response and compensation unit to expedite access to remedies.

In order to accelerate socio-economic growth, local governments often allocate their budgets to direct expenditures and capital investments. However, an issue arose under strict budget constraints, exacerbated by unequal regional fiscal capacities to fund strategic development programs. Moreover, such instrument impacts have been variously debated across the study. This study was designed to examine the impact of provincial government direct capital participation (PMD) and various parameters on local fiscal capacity (IKFD) using path analysis, unveiling both direct and indirect effects. The data were collected from 34 provinces over the period 2017–2024. Mediatory variables, such as Local Fiscal Autonomy (LFA) and KDD, were also incorporated within the model. The findings highlighted the significant effects of PMD, gross fixed capital formation, LFA, and regional capital expenditure in corroborating local fiscal capacity, thereby increasing the urgency of management of the respective instruments. Ultimately, local fiscal capacity advancement through good governance will potentially return substantial benefits, providing more financial capacity for strengthening the socio-economic state and supporting national agendas.

This study examines the role of government in strengthening national food security through a hybrid approach combining a systematic literature review (SLR) and bibliometric analysis. Literature data were collected from the Scopus database using the query "government role AND food security," yielding 22 articles for qualitative synthesis. The findings identify four key governance dimensions: local government initiatives, national government support, agricultural policy, and intersectoral collaboration. Effective food security governance requires coordinated action across levels of government, supported by clear legislation, adequate funding, and partnerships with civil society and the private sector. Agricultural policies promoting smallholder farmer groups, technology access, and sustainable practices further strengthen food availability and household-level resilience. Bibliometric analysis reveals dominant research clusters around policymaking, climate change, food insecurity, and governance, reflecting the multidimensional nature of food security challenges. However, several implementation barriers persist, including weak intergovernmental coordination, limited rural infrastructure, low technology adoption among smallholder farmers, and insufficient adaptive capacity in the face of climate change. This study highlights the need for integrated, adaptive, and evidence-based governance frameworks to achieve sustainable and inclusive food security outcomes.

This study examines the mismatch between rising regional fiscal capacity and poverty reduction in West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) Province, 2019–2023. It responds to a puzzle: NTB’s Regional Fiscal Capacity Index rose sharply, especially in 2022–2023, while poverty declined only marginally and fluctuated. The research uses a qualitative approach with an instrumental case study design, supported by quantitative data on fiscal capacity and poverty trends. Data were collected through in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and document analysis of regional budgets, development plans, performance reports, and official statistics, then analyzed thematically to identify the mechanisms linking fiscal space to social outcomes. Trustworthiness was ensured through source and method triangulation, member checking, audit trails, and cross-source verification. The findings indicate that rising fiscal capacity has not effectively driven poverty reduction because it is constrained by three governance filters: institutional fragmentation across regional government agencies, the dominance of short-term charitable programs, and weaknesses in data systems and beneficiary targeting. Fiscal capacity is therefore a necessary but not sufficient condition for anti-poverty policy success. The study’s contribution lies in developing a fiscal capacity–governance filter–social outcome framework that explains why budgetary capacity fails to convert into welfare gains, extending the fiscal decentralization literature by positioning governance as a mediating mechanism rather than an administrative variable. Policy implications include strengthening the Regional Poverty Reduction Coordination Team, integrating beneficiary databases, adopting outcome-based budgeting, promoting evidence-based evaluation, and improving cross-agency coordination so that fiscal decentralization can work more effectively for poor communities in NTB.

This study analyzes the habitus and socio-cultural challenges in the governance of Red-and-White rural village cooperatives in rural Lampung from the perspective of the anthropology of development. Cooperatives are understood not only as economic entities but also as social spaces shaped by local values, norms, power relations, and cultural practices, and many development programs falter when these dimensions are overlooked. We employed a qualitative, constructivist approach drawing on in-depth interviews, observation, and documentation, with findings analyzed through data triangulation. Pierre Bourdieu’s (1977) theory of habitus serves as the main framework for explaining how social dispositions inform cooperative governance. The research was conducted in two pilot villages in Lampung, Rejomulyo and Bumisari. The findings indicate that cooperative success depends heavily on a village’s socio-economic character. In Rejomulyo, where most residents are farmers, cooperatives are most effective when focused on agriculture, whereas in Bumisari, which rests on micro, small, and medium enterprises, services, and trade, cooperatives develop along those lines. Cooperatives concentrate on absorbing local farm produce, selling fertilizer, operating minimarkets, and opening pharmacies, yet remain hesitant to offer savings and loan services. Challenges include limited capital, a small membership base, limited human-resource capacity, restricted access to partnerships, weak coordination with local governments, and competition from loan sharks and middlemen. The community’s collective habitus—marked by patronage, kinship ties, and social hierarchy—shapes cooperative governance. We argue that attending to local habitus is essential to strengthening cooperative institutions more adaptively and sustainably.

This study examines the association between civil servant performance management and the efficiency of regional budget utilization in the Government of Aceh Province, Indonesia. An explanatory sequential mixed-methods design was employed, combining a quantitative survey of 100 civil servants involved in regional planning, budgeting, financial management, and program evaluation with qualitative interviews of 12 key informants, including budget managers, planning officials, and internal supervisors. Quantitative data were analyzed using multiple linear regression, and qualitative data were examined through thematic analysis to explain the statistical findings. The results indicate that the six dimensions of civil servant performance management are collectively and statistically associated with the efficiency of regional budget utilization, although the explanatory power of the model is relatively modest. At the individual level, financial compliance and outcome orientation are positively and significantly associated with budget efficiency, and timeliness is significantly but negatively associated with it, whereas performance planning, implementation productivity, and monitoring and evaluation show no significant relationship. Qualitative findings suggest that these patterns reflect differences between the substantive and the procedural implementation of performance management practices, particularly regarding fiscal compliance, outcome-focused budgeting, and year-end budget execution. This study contributes to the literature by suggesting that formal performance management systems alone are insufficient to improve regional budget efficiency; rather, efficiency is more closely associated with substantive fiscal compliance, outcome orientation, and implementation quality within decentralized public administration.