Caterers under the school feeding program in the Upper East Region have failed to cook meals for basic school children after two weeks of school reopening.
The caterers are per the policy document of the school feeding program supposed to feed the school children one hot nutritious meal a day from the date of school reopen to the date of school vacation.
A two day visit to most schools in some districts of the Upper East Region revealed that the Caterers have not being coking for the school children since school resumed on 18th January, 2022.
Some students and teachers disclosed to reporters with word FM news desk that the Caterers have not reported to the school since reopened neither have they called the school authorities to explain reasons for their absence.
One headteacher who spoke to us on condition of anonymity had this to say:
“ They have not being to school since school reopened. We have not seen them. They have not cooked for our kids for the two weeks since school reopened and they have not called to tell us anything.”
He continued that he has only heard that they have refused to cook because government has not paid them.
“ I only heard that they have refused to come and cook for the kids because government has not paid them and that government owe them so much.”
Some students who we spoke to said that the failure of the caterers to cook the meals for them is affecting how often they come to school and how long they stay in school.
“They have not being cooking for us since school reopened. We come to school everyday but by afternoon,when we peep through the window towards the kitchen, we don’t see any activity going on there. We get discouraged when we realized that there won’t be food. Please you people should plead with them to come and cook for us.”
The students said most of the students leave school by noon when they realize that there won’t be food.
“Usually most of our mates run home by 12 noon when they see that the kitchen is empty. They run home to look for food because around that time,most of us are always hungry. We can’t concentrate on what the teacher is teaching from that time. Some of us too even refuse to even turn up for school when we realize that there won’t be food”
When our reporter, Mr. Simon Agana reached out to some of the caterers on phone to find out reasons for their failure to cook meals for the school children, one of them said
“we always collect orders from School feeding secretariat to start cooking. We can’t just start cooking when school reopens and if you cook who will pay you? All the schools no caterer has started cooking yet. It isn’t that they have asked us to cook and we are not cooking. The payment has delayed. They have not payed for long. They just started paying yesterday and even that one, they didn’t pay all of us so that is why we have not started cooking.
The caterer disclosed that the school feeding caterers are owed two terms arrears by government.
“they haven’t paid all school feeding caterers in Ghana for two terms and can you imagine borrowing from one supplier for that long? The suppliers have refused to supply us with food items.”
The ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection on Thursday, 27th January,2022 announced in a press release that it has fully paid caterers for the second term of the 2021 academic year.
” This is to notify the caterers of the Ghana School Feeding Program (GSFP), Metropolitan, Municipal,and District Chief Executives,(MMDCEs) and the general public that the Government has fully paid the second term of the 2022 academic year.”
The caterers however, say not all of them have been paid. They also say the second semester payment does not clear the two term areas owed the by the ministry.
This year, government increased the Ghana School Feeding Program (GSFP) from 3.4 million to over four million pupils with the feeding grant pegged at Gh₵ 1.00 per child each feeding day.
The School Feeding Program (SFP) GSFP was initiated in 2005 as a social protection intervention in the context of the Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Program (CAADP) Pillar III which provide an opportunity to pursue Ghana’s commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals. Goal one which seeks to end poverty in all its forms everywhere and Goal two, which aims at ending hunger, achieving food security and improved nutrition while promoting sustaining agriculture fall within this purview. Goal four seeks to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education opportunities is very important as it seeks to enhance access of girls and boys to quality early childhood development and ensure their access to safe, nutritious and sufficient food all year round.
Currently the program is expected to provide students in public basic schools across the country one hot mean every school going day.
source: Simon Agana Blessing/mywordfmonline.com