Pretoria - Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga says there is strong evidence that school feeding schemes lead to increased enrolment, increased participation in class and high levels of concentration.
The Minister said this on Monday at the official handover of kitchens at Phuthikwena Combined School in Limpopo.
In addition to the feeding scheme, the Minister promoted the deworming of young children to promote learner wellbeing and children staying in school.
She also encouraged learners to always practice good hygiene habits by washing their hands before and after eating.
“All of us should adopt healthy behavioural attitude in our homes and classrooms. It starts with a habit of handwashing with clean water and soap after every activity, especially before handling food or after visiting the small room,” she said.
The kitchens handover programme is a public-private partnership between government and Massdiscounters [Game], which the Minister thanked for supporting the improvement of facilities for the National School Nutrition Programme (NSNP).
She said through the NSNP, nutritious cooked meals are provided to about 9.2 million learners every school day.
“Massdiscounters has now donated a total of 273 kitchens, which is worth celebrating because a single kitchen can be costly.
“This is also affirmation of the successes of public-private partnerships in addressing challenges in the education sector.
“Government alone is not in a position to meet all the infrastructure backlogs and needs in schools. To provide adequate infrastructure can be costly,” she said.
The Minister said due to a large number of NSNP schools in the public education system, support from the private sector is therefore needed to improve kitchen cooking and preparation facilities. - SAnews.gov.za
