"This is the focus in the second year of GNPIP, (wherein we) conduct synergy and innovation for national food resilience," Deputy Governor of BI Aida S. Budiman remarked.
Budiman delivered the remark during an event by GNPIP and South Sumatra Food Self-Sufficiency Initiative (GSMP) that brought up the theme of "Synergy and Innovation for Food Resilience Through South Sumatra Food Self-Sufficiency Initiative Program" accessed here on Friday.
Collaboration and innovation must be conducted from end to end, in an integrated manner, from the start until the end: from production to managing the harvest and until product marketing.
To this end, the GNPIP aims to press down the inflation rate on food by intervening in the supply aspect and encouraging production.
The efforts are also coupled with actual measures to ensure national food resilience in 2023, i.e. cooperation among regions and market operations prior to national holidays.
Budiman urged everyone to partake in efforts to ensure food supply for national food resilience, which grows ever more urgent on account of challenges, such as the weather anomaly and longer drought in 2023.
"Food is the basic need of our people. Hence, let us fulfill those basic needs by (ensuring) enough supply at affordable prices," she stated.
Collaboration is also crucial in maintaining the food commodity prices. Affordable price means that people can buy items, thereby concurrently ensuring the welfare of farmers.
That ideal aligns with President Joko Widodo's directives at the opening of the 2023 National Work Meeting of the National Association of the Provincial Government in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan, on Friday, February 23, 2023, she noted.
In the directive, the regional governments were urged to maintain stocks and prices of food commodities in their respective areas to prevent food-related issues.
The Meteorological, Climatological, and Geophysical Agency has forecast that the drought in 2023 will be more dry as compared to the last three years, in 2020, 2021, and 2022.
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Translator: Martha Herlinawati S, Mecca Yumna
Editor: Rahmad Nasution
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