1.4m new children to go on School Feeding Programme

Women, Gender and Social Protection Minister-designate, Otiko Afisah Djaba, has announced that government will increase enrolments onto the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) by 1.4 million.

The new enrolments will take the total number of school children on the social intervention programme to about 3 million.

Afiko Djaba told the Appointments Committee of Parliament: “The Ghana School Feeding Programme currently covers over 1.6milion school children; government intends to push up the number significantly with an additional 1.4 million.”

The (GSFP) was introduced by the erstwhile John Agyekum Kuffour-led New Patriotic Party (NPP) in 2005 with the aim of improving school enrolment, attendance and retention as well as to alleviate short-term hunger and malnutrition.

The programme has however been faced with criticisms owing the delays in the payment of arrears owed to caterers and its associated hold back in implementation.

But the sector minister-designate has assured that monies owed caterers would soon be paid to curtail undue delays in the running of the programme.

– bft