By: Loa Murib
The designation of Cenderawasih University (Uncen) as a Regional Centre of Excellence (RCOE) for the Free Nutritious Meals (MBG) program in Papua is a strategic step worthy of appreciation. This move underscores the government’s seriousness in prioritizing children’s nutrition issues as a key focus of human development, particularly in eastern Indonesia, which still faces significant challenges in nutritional access and equality. The nationally implemented MBG program requires a local coordination and innovation center to ensure more effective, locally adaptive, and sustainable implementation.
The Papua Provincial Government welcomes the establishment of Uncen as an RCOE. The presence of this institution is expected to become a driving force for strengthening local capacities, through research, innovation development, and field personnel training for health workers, teachers, and community cadres. Beyond serving as a learning hub, the RCOE is anticipated to function as a cross-sectoral collaboration space, combining academic approaches, public policy, and local wisdom to achieve nutritional resilience in Papua.
Acting Expert Staff to the Governor of Papua for Community and Cultural Development, Matias Mano, stated that the Papua Provincial Government is fully committed to supporting the sustainability of the MBG program. This commitment goes beyond administrative support and includes promoting multi-stakeholder involvement in program implementation and enhancing grassroots human resource capacities. He emphasized that MBG is not merely about food distribution, but a long-term social investment targeting the most vulnerable groups: toddlers, pregnant women, and students in remote areas.
In Papua’s challenging geographical context, equitable access to nutritious food is critical. Without sufficient and safe nutritional intake, children face risks of stunting, delayed cognitive development, and reduced productivity in the future. Therefore, MBG should be understood as the state’s commitment to social justice. There must be no distinction in treatment between children in major cities and those living in remote villages.
Within this framework of justice, strengthening the distribution infrastructure of the MBG program becomes an urgent matter. One innovative approach now being proposed is the establishment of satellite kitchens in remote areas. This idea was voiced by Petrus Thokiman, Advisor of the Kencana Papua Nusantara Foundation, who expressed hope that MBG will truly reach children in underdeveloped areas, particularly in Fakfak, West Papua.
According to Petrus, MBG implementation remains concentrated in urban areas, leaving children in remote villages yet to fully benefit from the program. To bridge this gap, the establishment of MBG satellite kitchens presents a practical solution. Besides ensuring faster and more efficient distribution of nutritious food, this concept also allows for local community empowerment. Petrus emphasized that local food sources such as sago, yams, taro, and vegetables from community gardens should be integrated into MBG menus. This would promote food resilience while simultaneously empowering local economies.
Furthermore, satellite kitchens align with the spirit of decentralized public services that adapt to Papua’s geographical characteristics. With regulatory and funding support from the central government and development partners, these kitchens can be established at strategic points, especially in areas far from main roads or located in mountainous and remote coastal regions. Thus, children in these locations would receive equal treatment and not be marginalized from national policies that should be inclusive.
It is important to understand that the success of the MBG program depends not only on the availability of nutritious food, but also on efficient and participatory governance. Therefore, support from various parties—including universities, civil society organizations, the private sector, and development partner countries such as Australia, China, and Japan—is crucial. These stakeholders have long contributed to strengthening more resilient and sustainable food and nutrition systems in Papua.
As a center of excellence, Uncen can play a strategic role in developing training modules, conducting locally based nutrition intervention research, and building a data-driven monitoring and evaluation system. This is vital for identifying nutrition-vulnerable areas, evaluating menu effectiveness, and designing more targeted follow-up interventions. As a center of knowledge, universities are ideally positioned to integrate scientific approaches with the social and cultural context of Papuan communities.
Ultimately, all these efforts serve a single purpose: ensuring that every Papuan child has a healthy, intelligent, and productive future. Human development cannot be separated from meeting basic needs such as adequate nutrition. Therefore, the MBG program must be positioned as a top priority—not merely as a temporary social initiative, but as a national strategy to strengthen the foundation of the nation’s future generations.
Building Papua is not just about constructing roads and bridges. Building Papua is also about building its people—starting from their plates. If implemented seriously, the MBG program could be the answer to Papua’s multidimensional challenges: from poverty, educational inequality, to the region’s low human development index. Now is the time to unite efforts and expand this program’s reach so that no child is left behind simply because of where they were born.
The writer is a Papuan student in Surabaya
