Loving local products must be instilled in the hearts and minds of citizens from an early age, Secretary General of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research and Technology Suharti has said.

She made the statement during the launch of the Aroma Maluku Proud of Indonesian Product Movement (Gernas BBI), accessed from here on Friday.

She said her office is optimistic that it can help make the Gernas BBI program a success, with 500 thousand educational units and more than 60 million students nationwide participating in it.

“Through schools, students are encouraged to love local products,” she added.

The movement will help the younger generation produce better innovations that can be accepted by the market, she informed. Therefore, collaboration with other stakeholders is needed, she said.

Meanwhile, Director General for Vocational Education at the Ministry of Education, Research and Technology Wikan Sakarinto said that ever since the program started to be massively promoted in 2020, more than 15 million MSMEs have put their products on e-commerce platforms.

As many as 7 million of the total 15 million MSMEs have been trained through the Gernas BBI program, he informed.

He said he hoped that students, teachers, education staff, and more parties would work hand in hand to strengthen the country’s economic recovery by supporting and buying local products.

The program involves vocational school students in the learning process of producing products through applied research, entrepreneurship, and digital marketing training focused on providing insightful knowledge and expertise in supporting the MSME orientation process, he informed.

“Through this movement, we will mobilize our educational institutions to participate in (the country’s) economic recovery and produce real products that are targeted to the market,” Sakarinto remarked.

Source: Antara News