School Feeding Using Locally Grown Food, Ghana

Sometimes moving a good idea forward can be a slow, complicated process. But, when the goal is an admirable one, it is important to keep working towards it. Such is the case with an incredible project in Ghana. School feeding programs have been around for a long time. They are designed to keep children in school by providing them with meals. By doing so, the children receive an education and improved nutrition at the same time. Often however, the food used in the program comes from overseas aid. Tons of rice, corn, etc., are shipped in to feed the kids. But, very frequently, some of this food is sold in the local markets in order to generate cash to pay for transportation, wages, storage, fuel, etc. Sounds reasonable at first. But, the sudden influx of such food into the market can be devastating to the farmers in the area. Suddenly they are unable to compete with the imported goods and their livelihoods are devastated. Time and again we've seen this happen.

So this program offers a new twist. Food isn't imported. Instead, local farmers are encouraged to grow extra food for sale to the schools. The money paid for the food enters the local economy and increases the livelihoods of the villages in the immediate vicinity of the schools. Sounds easy. But, implementing this in an entire country is tough. We've been helping such an effort in Ghana for the last three and a half years. The Dutch government has committed $25 million a year, for ten years towards the purchase of locally produced food. From 8 schools, the program has grown to well over a thousand. But that's only about 500,000 kids. We're aiming for up to 4,000,000. But, the locally produced food aspect of the program is lagging. See one comment at: http://allafrica.com/stories/200709271040.html An example of problems can be found at: http://ghana2008.wordpress.com/2007/06/03/school-feeding-programme-dissolves-procurement-committees/ There are plenty of hardworking, committed people trying to solve the problems. We've had five IBD teams assisting them over the previous 3 years and a sixth one will be in Ghana in May and June, 2008. A retired Unilever Senior VP and a retired Time Warner executive are working hard to make this a success. So, stay tuned.