Expanding opportunities for the world's children to receive adequate nutrition for learning and achieving their potential.
Please mark your calendars for the upcoming “A Possible Dream” Gala on Monday, March 5, 2012. Those in attendance will be from international NGOs, the U.S. Congress, USAID, USDA, industry, the School Nutrition Association, and other key agencies working to reduce hunger around the world.
One hungry child in the world is one hungry child too many. In this current economic climate, millions more children are now at risk, in addition to the 350 million already identified by the World Food Programme. GCNF works to end child hunger by establishing and maintaining school feeding programs in developing countries.
You have the power to make it possible for all children, especially girls, to attend school. Join us and make your sponsorship pledge now to help alleviate their hunger; improve their ability to learn; and motivate their parents to send them to school.
If you have any questions regarding sponsorship opportunities, please contact Nicole Bernard at NBernard@schoolnutrition.org or call 301.686.3150. If you cannot attend the Gala, please make a contribution to GCNF by clicking the “Donate” button. We greatly appreciate your support and look forward to working together to advance our vision of living in a world in which hunger is not a barrier to children learning.
*Pictures and article contributed by Desire Yameogo, Country Director, Nutrition Health and Humanitarian Services, Counterpart International
School Feeding to be Given Higher Priority in Cameroon
Cameroon Government to Copy, Implement Plan Elsewhere
In the remote village of Tadu in Northwest Cameroon, the approximately 5,000 inhabitants Mbororo people and others with poverty, malnutrition and low school enrollment rates, especially among girls.
Conditions began to change in 2009 through an innovative program that is part of the U.S. Agriculture Department’s McGovern-Dole Food for Education project, which is implemented by the nonprofit Counterpart International. The three-year project promotes and supports school feeding activities as a means of encouraging school enrollment and attendance in rural communities.
“Our children previously left for school hungry and often crying. But now they are eager for each new school day to begin. Their happiness makes us proud and very happy to cook for them,” said a volunteer cook at Tadu’s government-run primary school.
The main components of the project include school feeding, take-home rations, health and nutrition education, growth monitoring, building school gardens and the refurbishment of onsite facilities, such as school latrines and kitchens, which needed to be updated to carry out program activities effectively.
In only two years, it has had dramatic results:
The success of Counterpart’s program in the Northwest region of the country has been very highly praised.
In June 2011, Tadu welcomed a delegation from the Management Committee comprised of staff from the World Food Program (WFP), the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and Cameroon’s Ministry of Basic Education. They were welcomed by an enthusiastic crowd of some 1,000 community members and school children upon arrival at Tadu’s government-run primary school.
During their visit, the delegation visited the village’s school garden and the almost 1.5 hectare school farm, where food commodities like maize, potatoes, tomatoes, cabbages and other vegetables are cultivated to supplement U.S.-donated commodities of rice, beans and vegetable oil.
The school gardens and farms also serve as outdoor laboratories for lessons on environmental education and agriculture, which ensure the long-term sustainability of the project. The gardens have generated additional income for the school through the sale of produce. The money generated is used to support other school activities.
The visiting delegation had the chance to see the school’s 24 square meter food storage area, which stores both imported and locally cultivated food commodities. The school’s updated and well-equipped kitchen, which was specially designed to conserve energy by using less wood fuel, is another example of the improvements made under the MGD project.
Besides improving facilities at the school, the project also provided community members with training so that they could effectively manage the new facilities.
“Before we did not know how to prepare food for such a large number of people, but with the training given to us by the project’s health and nutrition staff,” said one participant when asked how the wider community had benefitted from the school feeding program. “We are now invited whenever there is a major occasion in the village and paid to cook for visiting dignitaries.”
The delegation then watched the children eating their school lunch of rice, beans and vegetables. After lunch, there was a working session where parents and teachers exchanged experiences and ideas about the project, the management of the school gardens, the new skills and hygiene and sanitation practices acquired through the project.
“We had heard so much about this program during our various meetings with partners in Yaounde, what we have witnessed here today, is simply marvelous,” said Richard Temfack, Coordinator of the WFP/FAO Management Committee.
The visitors were impressed by the overall level of participation, not just of the school staff and children, but also the participation of parents and the wider community.
“We have learned a lot from you and shall carry your example elsewhere,” said the leader of the delegation, Madam Alice Montheu. She promised that given the enthusiasm shown by the community in supporting their children’s health and education, she will encourage the Ministry of Basic Education to personally visit the project and provide further infrastructural support to the school.
As a result of this visit, the Minister of Basic Education has already indicated that school feeding will be given high priority in Cameroon’s forthcoming National Education Forum.
Circle Monday, March 5, 2012, on your calendar to join GCNF in a celebration of the 2011 champions of child nutrition at the 9th annual A Possible Dream Gala. Make your pledge to ending childhood hunger today and mail in your sponsorship commitment form. Proceeds from this event enable GCNF to provide technical assistance to countries with expanding and developing school feeding programs. Appropriately designed school feeding programs have been shown to increase access to education and learning while improving children’s health and nutrition. Your continued support of GCNF and commitment to ending childhood hunger actually makes a difference in the lives of the world’s children.
As a direct result of GCNF’s technical assistance provided during the annual Global Forum, Mali’s government leaders worked with the Ministry of Education and other agencies in 2009 to draft a national policy that included a five-year plan for 3,000 government-assisted school canteens. In November 2009 the Council of Ministers committed to a five-year plan, strengthening and extending the school feeding program financed by national and territorial governments, technical and financial partners. At the 2010 Forum in Ghana, delegates reported successful collaborations and the impressive fact that 15.4 percent of school children are now receiving meals during the school day.
The Gala is attended by over 500 executives from our most supportive industries, School Nutrition Association officers and directors, and high level government and NGO officials. The highlight of the evening will be the presentation of the prestigious Gene White Lifetime Achievement Award for Child Nutrition to Ambassador Tony P. Hall, Executive Director, Alliance to End Hunger. In addition, GCNF will honor the School Nutrition Association’s (SNA) Industry Member of the Year, Tony Roberts, Proprietor of the Tony Roberts Company and SNA’s Outstanding Director of the Year, Lyman Graham, Director, Roswell Independent School District, Carlsbad Municipal Schools and Dexter Consolidated Schools, New Mexico.
School feeding programs provide nourishment to impoverished children who are then encouraged to attend school, are alert while they are in school, and through their education, go on to become self-sufficient, contributing citizens in their countries. Please join us once again as we honor the champions of child nutrition on Monday, March 5, 2012.
* Please view the Press Release for more information.
