Jakarta (ANTARA) - Head of the National Food Agency (Bapanas) Arief Prasetyo Adi emphasized that the government has continued to make efforts to conduct interventions in order to stabilize food prices and ensure inflation remains under control.
He made the statement while accompanying President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) for a review of the distribution of rice assistance in Cilegon, Banten, on Tuesday.
"Today, we are assisting the President to distribute rice assistance in Cilegon. This is one of our efforts to maintain people's purchasing power in order to control inflation," he said in an official statement received on Tuesday.
Adi explained that the rice assistance is targeted at people belonging to the low-income group. Meanwhile, for the community in general, the government is running the Food Supply and Price Stabilization (SPHP) program and the Cheap Food Movement, which are being intensified in all regions.
He further said that the distribution of SPHP rice, sold in 5-kilogram packaging, has been stepped up to ensure rice supply to both traditional markets and modern retailers to prevent a surge in rice prices.
According to him, the increase in rice prices is proportional to the increase in the price of unhusked rice. Meanwhile, the availability of unhusked rice has decreased due to annual production trends.
"Currently, unhusked rice in the field is limited. Indeed, usually in the last three months at the end of the year, monthly rice production is below the needs," he said.
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To this end, he added, it is essential for the government to strengthen food reserves, as regulated by Presidential Regulation Number 125 of 2022. The interventions that are currently being made to stabilize prices are sourcing rice from government food reserves, he continued.
So far, 1.4 million tons of rice from the government's rice reserves has been distributed under the rice assistance program and the SPHP market operation.
Currently, the State Logistics Agency (Bulog) has secured 1.6 million tons of rice, and the government is still awaiting the arrival of 400 thousand tons of rice from abroad.
During the second phase of rice assistance targeting 21.353 million beneficiary families, a total of 640 thousand tons of rice will be distributed.
The Indonesian government is carrying out the second three-month phase of rice assistance distribution from September, under which each beneficiary will receive 10kg of rice per month.
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