Semarang, C Java (ANTARA) - The Central Java Provincial Government has reserved 200 tons of rice to deal with the El Nino phenomenon.

"We have prepared government food reserves amounting to 200 tons of rice along with the cheap food movement and the food distribution facilitation so that the community can get them at affordable prices," Head of the Central Java Food Security Office Dyah Lukisari said here on Sunday.

Her office has prepared strategies to maintain food supplies and provision of rice that will be distributed to regions.

"We will distribute it to 770 groups in regions where each group gets 2.2 tons of rice," she said.

According to her, the government's food reserves will be distributed to the regions based on priority.

The office also cooperates with the State Logistics Agency (BULOG), which has thousands of tons of rice reserves for each district or city in Central Java.

In addition to rice, Lukisari said her side distributes thousands of packets of local food.

As of June 2023, there were still five thousand packets of cassava flour noodles being reserved.

"When food prices soar because demand increases, we tackle it with the cheap food movement and boost distribution facilitation to cope with the rising prices," she said.

Her side also educates the public to stop food waste. The Cut Food Waste campaign is carried out from the school level to the general public.

"In addition to relying on the Central Java Province's food reserves, there are also reserves from BULOG, which have stocks of around 100 tons for each district," she said.

Meanwhile, local stocks of food, such as rice, corn, and cassava, have been reserved for emergency situations.

The Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) has predicted that Indonesia will experience El Nino this year, with its peak in August.



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Translator: Wisnu N, Kenzu
Editor: Azis Kurmala
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