RRI.CO.ID, Jakarta – Indonesia's Ministry of Health has issued a regulation requiring the inclusion of a nutrition label called "Nutri Level" on ready-to-consume foods and drinks, especially sweetened beverages. It was released on Tuesday, 14 April 2026, to encourage healthier consumption patterns among the country's public.

Minister of Health, Budi Gunadi Sadikin, conveyed the decision was made as an educational measure to prevent excessive consumption of sugar, salt, and fat. The uncontrolled consumption of them can lead to various non-communicable diseases such as obesity, hypertension, stroke, and diabetes, proven to cause financial burden on Indonesia's universal health care system.

"Therefore, efforts need to be made through providing information and education so that the public can more easily choose the right and healthy ready-to-eat food according to their needs," Budi said, as quoted from the ministry statement on Wednesday, April 15, 2026.

He added that the policy is also part of the mandate of the Health Act, so that all cross-sectoral disease prevention policies can be implemented in harmony. The inclusion of Nutri Level is based on the business's independent statement on sugar, salt, and fat levels, as tested by government-owned or other accredited laboratories.

Under this regulation, ready-to-drink sweetened beverages produced by large-scale businesses are required to display the Nutri Level on various platforms, including packaging, advertisements, and list of menus. However, in the initial stages, it is not applied to micro, small, and medium-scale fast-food businesses such as food stalls, food carts, and small or simple restaurants.

The Nutri Level system comprises four color- and alphabetically ordered letter-coded categories. The green-colored category A has the lowest levels of sugar, salt, and fat, whereas the red-colored category D has the highest.

Earlier, the Indonesian Food and Drug Monitoring Agency (BPOM) had approved the Nutri Level system, as announced by the agency head, Taruna Ikrar, on Thursday, 8 April 2026. Taruna said BPOM will roll out the labeling in stages, prioritizing sweetened beverages first.

"Because, so far, what is most related to sugar, salt, and fat is usually from drinks," Taruna said.

The nutrition scoring, like Nutri Level, was first used by France in 2017, and is recommended by the European Union and the World Health Organisation (WHO). Indonesia's neighbor, Singapore, has earlier adopted the system, with its "Nutri-Grade" labeling.