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Koforidua, Ghana – The National Coordinator of the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP), Dr. Kwame Adu Nsiah has said that the Government has solid plans to migrate the Junior High Schools (JHS) onto the school feeding programme immediately when all the primary schools in Ghana are fully covered.
He said even though there are implausible plans by the GSFP and for that matter Government to cover all basic schools in Ghana, it is somewhat illogical to sideline the remaining uncovered Kindergarten and primary schools and jump straight to the Junior High School.
Speaking at a two day training of trainers’ workshop for GSFP stakeholders at Koforidua in the Eastern Region, Dr. Adu Nsiah said “we’ve seen that when children get to primary six and they are supposed to go to JHS one, it becomes a big issue for them”.
Adding that, “Some of them don’t even want to go to the JHS one; they still want to stay in class six all because they want food. It is not a mistake to go to JHS one. So we are talking to the Government and other key stakeholders so that we can include the JHS, but that can only happen when we’re done with the primary schools”.
According to him, Government has shown its commitment to increasing the number of school feeding beneficiaries.
The Government, Dr. Adu Nsiah noted increased the beneficiaries from 37% (1,677,000) in 2016 to 62% (2,848,580) in 2018. But he said the vision of the Government is to achieve 100% coverage in the nearest future before tackling the JHS.
Responding to concerns raised by the stakeholders to get the school feeding grant increased to at least GHc2.00, the National Coordinator of the GSFP admitted that the GHc1.00 budgeted for the GSFP per child was unsatisfactory and that even though the government was currently saddled with a lot of responsibilities, there is a conscious effort to get government to increase the amount to GHc1.50 or GHc2.00 per child.
He emphasized on the need for the caterers to be more hygienic and conscious about the quality of meal they prepare for the children. Dr. Adu Nsiah that, the children would grow well and healthy if they are fed with the right amount of nutrition in the meal they consume on daily basis.
Meanwhile, the Ghana School Feeding Programme has embarked on nationwide training of key stakeholders as trainers to also train caterers of the programme to ensure food safety, nutrition and hygiene.
By Savannahnewsonline.com/Philip Liebs
