There were no signs or guards posted outside the Bulungan Sports Hall, but the intent was clear: "No Men Allowed".

Inside, more than 200 mothers were breast-feeding their babies.

The occasion itself was designed to raise awareness of the qualities of breast-feeding, but Saturday's event was symbolic of the privacy and facilities needed by working mothers in the workplace.

"Even though the Labor Law grants women the right to breast-feed at work sites, the government is silent against companies who do not follow this rule," said Nia Umar, deputy chairwoman of the Indonesian Association of Breast-feeding Mothers (AIMI), after the event held in conjunction with World Breast-feeding Week.

Article 83 of the 2003 Labor Law states a working mother must be allowed to breast-feed her baby during work hours.

This requires the company to allot sufficient time for the mother and, according to AIMI advocates, provide adequate facilities.

AIMI coordinator Amanda Tasya lamented the lack of enforcement on this part of the law, and negligence of companies in providing such facilities.

"There's no sanction imposed for any violations, making this regulation useless," Tasya said.

Nia said very few very companies made available such facilities to breast-feeding mothers, including government offices.

She pointed out the Bekasi Administration Office as one of the few public offices which provided exclusive facilities for lactating mothers.

It was AIMI's work, she added, "to empower women to be critical of their working institutions, pushing them to demand their right to breast-feed in the workplace".

While the law states working mothers cannot be dismissed for breast-feeding at work, Nia decried the attitude of many companies for failing to provide facilities and disregarding supporting bylaws referring to the breast-feeding issue.

"Despite the regulations, in practice it is difficult to implement," she said.

"In the end, employees have to unite to ensure companies abide by the regulations."

She gave the example of a case in which a mother, with AIMI's help, succeeded in lobbying her company to set up a breast-feeding room.

Highlighting the importance of breast-feeding children, Nia lamented the overdependence of many mothers on formula milk.

For over a decade, a draft government regulation on marketing of formula milk has been left in limbo.

Nia said the regulation was needed to stop what she claimed was the continued spread of false and misleading information on the qualities of formula milk.

Bureaucratic entanglements and commercial interests have been cited as the source of the delay.

"The Trade Ministry, for instance, claims the regulation would threaten employment in companies producing formula milk," Nia said.

She insisted such a regulation, however, would be in accordance with guidelines set out by the World Health Organization on dealing with the aggressive advertising of formula milk.

These practices include widespread distribution of discharge packs in maternity wards that advertise formula milk.

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