4m pupils benefit from FG’s daily free meal

ABUJA—FOUR million pupils from 25,771 schools across 17 states have benefited from the Federal Government Home Grown Feeding programme, Laolu Akande, Senior Special Assistant to Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on Media and Publicity, has said.
School feeding The School Feeding Programme is one of the crucial part of President Muhammadu Buhari administration’s Social Investment Programmes, SIP, aimed at tackling poverty and hunger, as well as creating jobs for Nigerians.
Akande in a statement in Abuja, yesterday, said three new states of Akwa Ibom, Cross River and Niger were the new states that had been covered in the programme.
The other 14 states already on the programme, he said, were Anambra, Enugu, Oyo, Osun, Ogun, Ebonyi, Zamfara, Delta, Abia, Benue, Plateau, Bauchi, Taraba and Kaduna.
The statement said: “So far, in Cross River State, 117,750 children in 973 schools are being fed under the programme, while in Akwa Ibom, there are 171,732 children in 1,101 schools being fed. Niger State has a total of 710,880 being fed in 2,411 schools in the state.
“In total, 4,773,064 schoolchildren in 25,771 schools in 17 states are currently benefitting from the school feeding programme. This is a notable increase from the previous total of 2,918,842 schoolchildren from 19,881 schools in 14 states that had benefitted from the programme.”
Besides, he said about 34,869 direct jobs had since been created from the feeding programme across the participating states, saying: “In Cross River State, for example, 1,384 cooks have been engaged, while 1,309 cooks are currently engaged in Akwa Ibom State, and 5,924 are engaged under the programme in Niger State.”
According to him, about 115,000 beneficiaries are now being funded with the monthly N5,000 stipend in 16 states, including Borno, Cross River, Niger, Kwara, Ekiti, Kogi, Oyo, Osun, Plateau, Bauchi, Anambra, Jigawa, Taraba and Adamawa.
Akande disclosed that there were reported disbursement hitches in Benue and Anambra states, and they were being addressed.
“This mainly has to do with non-opening of bank accounts and enrolling beneficiaries. It is expected that by the end of next month the hitches would have been completely resolved and the beneficiaries in position to receive the cash transfers in those states,” he said.

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