The Federal Government has so far released N844, 360, 550 for the commencement of the Homegrown School Feeding, a component of its Social Investment Programme, in seven states across the country.
The states that have received funding to begin the scheme include Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, Oyo, Osun, Ogun and Zamfara.
The Senior Special Assistant to the Acting President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Laolu Akande, disclosed this in a statement made available to journalists on Monday.
The Federal Government had earmarked N500bn for the SIP in the 2016 Budget while the same amount had been proposed for it in the 2017 Appropriation Bill currently before the National Assembly.
With the payment made as of the end of last week, Akande said the government had now released enough fund to start feeding more than one million pupils every school day in the seven states.
He clarified that while money has been made available to the seven states, the programme had commenced in only five states -Anambra, Enugu, Osun, Ogun, and Oyo States.
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He said the scheme was expected to start this week in Ebonyi and Zamfara States that have been funded already.
Akande said, “That means, the Buhari Presidency’s Homegrown School Feeding Programme would be feeding this week a total of 1, 043, 205 pupils in those seven states.
“Equally a total number of 11,775 cooks have now been employed to prepare the meals in those states already, while local farmers in the states are also the one producing the food prepared and served.
“Of all the states, Anambra, which was the first state to receive Federal Government’s funding late last year has now received three full funding tranches covering 30 school days, totaling N188, 769,000. The state has a total of 937 cooks and feeding 96,489 pupils.
“In Ebonyi, the Federal Government has also released a total of N115, 218, 600, while 1466 cooks have been engaged and 164, 598 pupils are to be fed.
“Also in Enugu State, government has released N67,244, 800 to feed 96, 064 pupils and 1,128 cooks engaged.”
Akande further disclosed that the government had released N119, 648, 900 to feed 170, 927 pupils and engage 1381 cooks in Ogun State while in Osun State, a total of N92, 425, 400 has been released to feed 142, 193 pupils with 2,688 cooks engaged.
For Oyo State, he said a total of N72, 288, 300 has been released to feed 103, 269 pupils, engaging 1,437 cooks, while of N188, 765, 500 has been released to feed 269, 665 pupils and engage 2, 738 cooks in Zamfara State.
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