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Welcome to The Inquiry from the BBC World Service.
I'm Tanya Beckett.
One question, four expert witnesses and an answer.
Southeast Asia's largest country is six months into an ambitious programme to tackle its problems with malnutrition amongst children –
free school meals.
The initiative, led by President Prabowo Sobianto,
is part of a much bigger plan to create what he calls a golden Indonesia in the next 20 years.
The hope is that a century after breaking free from colonial rule,
Indonesia will become a high-income country.
And giving the country's young adequate nutrients so they help fuel the nation over those next two decades is a key part of the plan.
But the challenge of reaching over 80 million children in a population spread over several hundred islands is proving costly,
problematic and even controversial.
This week on The Inquiry, we're asking, can Indonesia afford free lunches?
With such large populations and also diverse culture and also the level of education in Indonesia,
it has been a lot of different factors that is very challenging to achieve a nutrition level for children and also young people in Indonesia.
Malnutrition amongst children in Indonesia is a considerable problem.
About one in five are stunted, meaning they're too short for their age,
and one in 14 are too thin for their height.
These children are exposed to the risk of curb development and chronic diseases later in life.