Kenya is to launch the biggest school meals program in Africa this August, in a bid to tackle this issue of malnutrition and hunger in the country.
Nairobi County, in collaboration with the Kenyan not-for-profit organization Food4Education, is embarking on an ambitious initiative to construct ten new kitchens, that will serve as the foundation for providing 400,000 daily lunches to children attending 225 primary schools and Early Childhood Development centers in the Kenyan capital.
According to reports, the kitchens will be fueled by renewable energy utilizing eco-briquettes and steam gas technology.
In addition, a special technology, that has already been on the launched by Food4Education will be used: each child receives a wristband called "Tap2Eat", that is connected to a virtual wallet that parents use to pre-pay 15 Kenyan shillings ($0.11) for each meal.
The county government will subsidize the price of each meal using technology as well.
At the launch of the program earlier this week, the country's president, William Ruto noted that "will be deliberate and focused in ensuring successful implementation of the school feeding programme. The greatest indignity is for our children to go to school and fast because of lack of food.”
The government has taken steps to address it by allocating 5 billion Kenyan shillings ($36 million) to expand the existing national feeding program, stated the country's president William Ruto.
"We are going to match counties who have a plan on school feeding programme, shilling for shilling, and if we do that we can actually feed 8 million children in our schools," Ruto outlined.
This expansion aims to increase the number of children benefiting from the program from 1.6 million to 4 million.
The government has also pledged to further increase funding if additional counties demonstrate their commitment to the initiative.