Africa-Press – Namibia. THE World Food Programme (WFP) ‘urgently’ needs about N$19,2 million to continue with Namibia’s homegrown school feeding programme.
The WFP last week in a report said the shortfall in funding is as a result of Namibia’s status as upper middle-income country.
“Specifically, the programme serving school children in dire need requires urgent funding of U$321 500 (around N$5,7 million) for the period from July to December 2022, and U$ 769 500 (N$13,7 million) until December 2023,” the report reads.
However, the Ministry of Education, Arts And Culture yesterday told The Namibian it has already committed N$5million to the expansion of the programme in seven regions.
The ministry’s inspector of school feeding programmes, Andreas-Nangolo Shigwedha, said N$5 million would sustain the 29 schools which are already piloting the programme.
Currently, the country has 1 947 government schools.
“The funds from the ministry have nothing to do with the WFP. They are planning how to assist the education system on their own.
“There is a good working relationship between our ministry and the WFP to implement various activities and programmes aimed at strengthening and improving the livelihoods of the Namibian child,” he said.
Shigwedha said the effective execution of the programme would require funds to be mobilised by the ministry and the WFP.
Matching funding by the government would aid the WFP in raising funding from donors and the private sector, he said.
The WFP country operational update report shows at least 11 730 schoolchildren benefited from the programme in August this year, while 13 915 pupils benefited in August last year.
The WFP is also strengthening food systems through supporting smallholder agriculture market support.
In the report, the WFP has mobilised more than N$8 million from the government of Japan for food assistance through vouchers.
“The programme will impact a total of 21 600 beneficiaries (51% women and 49% men), including 3 680 malnourished children under the age of five in the Omaheke, Kunene and Oshikoto regions.
According to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), the targeted population, depicting a food crisis status, is highly vulnerable to shocks, thus requiring urgent assistance,” reads the report.
The ministry says 5 930 beneficiaries are boys and 5 800 girls.
Executive director of educaiton, arts and culture Sanet Steenkamp says the programme is an extension of the Namibia School Feeding Programme (NSFP), a model designed to provide pupils with safe, diverse and nutritious food sourced locally.
“The programme serves pupils with a diversified meal three times a week in compliance with the set menus.
“The food items are sourced from local smallholder producers in the proximity of the schools.
“This will improve and enhance the nutrition and health of pupils,” she says.
Steenkamp says the local school feeding programme stimulates the stable demand for food at local level, which in turn has multiplier effects on the local economy, food security and poverty reduction at household and community level.
EMPOWERING PRODUCERS
“It empowers local smallholder producers by creating a market for their produce when they sell their products to the piloting schools,” she says.
Steenkamp says the ministry has been implementing the NSFP in some public primary and combined schools since 1991.
With this particular programme, some 461 829 pupils from 1 514 schools have benefited.
Steenkamp says pupils receive a maize blend, which is procured through an open bidding process after which the successful bidders are contracted to supply schools on a term basis for three years.
This ministry has previously indicated that pupils in certain regions attend school purely because of the feeding programme.
According to the latest country report of the United Nations Children’s Fund, at least 45 000 children were pushed into poverty during the Covid-19 pandemic, making children in Namibia the poorest demographic group in the country.
This means more than half of Namibia’s children are poor, while 43,3% of Namibia’s total population live in poverty.
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