JAKARTA (Reuters) -An Indonesian government agency running President Prabowo Subianto’s massive free meals programme said on Friday its lack of oversight led to a recent outbreak of food poisoning among thousands of school children.
Concerns have mounted over the standards and supervision of the multi-billion-dollar initiative. Nearly 6,000 people have fallen ill after eating the free lunches since the programme’s January roll-out, government data showed, including more than 1,000 children in the country’s West Java province this week.
The programme has been rapidly expanded to reach more than 20 million recipients, with an ambitious goal of feeding 83 million by the end of the year. The agency said on Friday it estimated it could only spend 99 trillion rupiah ($5.92 billion) this year o