Gaining insights into how Australia can support the Indonesian president-elect’s pledge to provide free meals to more than 80 million school children was one of the purposes of a recent Grains Australia visit to Jakarta.
John Ackerman, Grains Australia’s General Manager Trade and Market Access, held discussions to find out more about the nutrition program, determine interest in feed grains and understand the regulatory approach being developed by the new Indonesian Quarantine Authority (IQA).
One of the key policies for Indonesia’s president-elect, Prabowo Subianto, is to provide free lunches and milk to Indonesian school children, starting from 2025. About $6.7 billion (71 trillion rupiah) has been budgeted for this initiative.
Dr Ackerman said the Indonesian Government aimed to significantly expand dairy and beef farming in Indonesia to meet the needs of the president-elect’s program.
“Large-scale beef and dairy cattle breeding programs will be developed, with millions of head of beef and dairy cattle to be imported over the next five years,” Dr Ackerman said.
“Accordingly, there is a strong push for improving efficiency in feed programs, protein technology, and supply chain management, especially given the challenges of producing fresh milk in proximity to large populated urban areas.”
Dr Ackerman met with Indonesian agriculture officials and industry representatives and was joined in some of his meetings by representatives from Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA) and the Australian Livestock Exporters’ Council (ALEC).
Together, they expressed broad support for Mr Prabowo’s nutrition program and during the meetings increased their understanding of the program’s activities to determine how Australia might best support them.
Dr Ackerman said Indonesia was seeking proactive engagement, and there were opportunities for Australia to support feed grain production and to provide technological and human resource capacity building.
“There is an important role for Australia to play, including in improved feed programs for livestock, best undertaken as a whole-of-sectorial approach in partnership with government,” Dr Ackerman said.
Grains Australia delivers value to the Australian grains industry through the provision of industry services and functions including management of trade and market access, classification, market insights and market education that improves the industry’s competitiveness and profitability.
Grains Australia is an initiative of the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC). GRDC leads investment in grains research, development and extension (RD&E) in Australia to create enduring profitability for grain growers.
A partnership between the Australian Government and grain growers, GRDC’s primary objective is to drive the discovery, development and delivery of world-class innovation to enhance the productivity, profitability and sustainability of Australian grain growers and benefit the industry and the wider community.