Agricom.id, JAKARTA – To face the pandemic of corona virus (Covid-19), one thing to strengthen is the food stock in the regional governments of cadangan pangan pemerintah daerah (CPPD). This is obliged based on the Laws No.18 / 2012 about Food and the Government’s Regulation No. 17 / 2015 about CPPD.

"The two regulations mandated that the regional governments, both in the province, district/city or village should have PPD," Head of Badan Ketahanan Pangan, Agung Hendriadi said in Jakarta, Saturday (18/4/2020) as in the official statement to Agricom.id.

He thought that CPPD would play the important role to anticipate the lack of food, the food price – disturbance, the natural disaster, social disaster, emergency, and to strengthen the food security in the regional and national scale.

“The regional government should have CPPD. If they have enough, this would very helpful to food security preparedness during the pandemic of Covid-19,” he said.

Until the second week of April 2020, 28 provinces and 238 districts have the CPPD. The stock commodity is rice reaching 11.300 tons.

About the Covid-19 and heading to Ramadan and Idul Fitri, 1441 Hijriah, the food availability is very crucial. Ministry of Internal Affairs supported it by publishing the Instruction of Minister of Internal Affairs No. 2 / 2020 about Maintaining the National Food Security in the emergency of Covid-19. Its publication is the same with the Circulars published by Minister of Agriculture about the Food Procurement in the pandemic of Covid-19.

Some provinces quickly responded by refocusing the budget to increase the numbers of CPPD in their regions. Head of Food Agency, District of Southeast Sulawesi, Abdullah Kawulusan said that CPPD which were 100 tons of rice would be increased to be 600 tons, namely to support the non-food centers in the province. The same thing was told by Head of Food Security Agency, Central Java province, Agus Wariyanto. He thought that the additional fund allocation for CPPD would be 800 tons of rice to anticipate the spread of Covid-19.

The regional governments should be consistent to implement the mandate of the two regulations about the CPPD management to guarantee the people to get the food during the pandemic. Not only in the province or district/city level, the village should prepare CPPD based on the Law No. 18 / 2012.

By the village fund that could be allocated to food, the food stock in the village would be easy to realize. The mechanism could be in cooperation with the village enterprises. (A2)