Abuja: ActionAid Nigeria has called on stakeholders to enhance community ownership of the Home-Grown School Feeding Programme (HGSFP) by prioritizing local sourcing. The organization emphasized the focus on women and farmers to ensure the sustainability of the initiative.
According to News Agency of Nigeria, the Country Director of ActionAid Nigeria, Mr. Andrew Mamedu, made this appeal at the National Policy Forum held in Abuja. The forum, themed ‘Institutionalisation and Implementation of the Home-Grown School Feeding Programme for Sustainable Economic Growth and Financial Inclusion in Nigeria,’ highlighted the programme’s multifaceted impact. Mamedu described the programme as not only a nutrition intervention but also an education strategy that keeps children in school and enhances learning outcomes. He further noted its role as an economic strategy promoting local farming and food markets, a social protection tool reducing hunger and inequality, a human capital development initiative offering guaranteed returns on investment, and a nation-building strategy fostering inclusion, stability, and sustainable development.
Mamedu asserted that institutionalizing the programme could significantly improve nutrition and learning, create jobs, enhance financial inclusion, and build resilience for future generations. He referenced the programme’s achievements under the previous administration, noting a 28 percent increase in school enrollment and over 50 percent improvement in pupil retention across many states. Nationwide, approximately seven million children in 40,000 public schools benefited from daily nutritious meals, engaging tens of thousands of cooks and smallholder farmers in the supply chain. These outcomes, he argued, demonstrate the programme’s effectiveness in linking education with economic opportunities.
Mamedu urged federal, state, and local governments to transcend short-term interventions, advocating for a school feeding system that is inclusive, sustainable, and transformative. He called for sustained financing through contributions from the Federation Account Allocation Committee, the Universal Basic Education Commission, the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, and other sources, emphasizing the need for stronger partnerships.
Despite a rise in basic education enrollment from 35 million to 40 million between 2018 and 2022, Mamedu highlighted the increase in out-of-school children from 9.1 million in 2000 to 14.6 million in 2020. He lamented Nigeria’s low score of 0.36 on the World Bank Human Capital Index, indicating that a child born today would achieve only 36 percent of their productive potential without significant changes. Currently, over 45 million children cannot read a simple text by age 10, and about 15 million are completely out of school, a crisis attributed to weak governance, underfunding, and systemic gaps.
Reaffirming ActionAid’s support for the Federal Government’s vision, Mamedu called the school feeding programme a proven pathway to address education and nutrition gaps. The forum aimed to present findings from a Political Economy Analysis (PEA) conducted by ActionAid, which identified systemic gaps and proposed policy pathways for resilient, locally sourced, and community-led school feeding systems. The gathering brought together government leaders, policymakers, civil society, development partners, and others to build consensus, foster political will, and establish a Multi-Stakeholder Technical Working Group to drive the programme’s nationwide institutionalization.