School midday meal:

Govt allocates Rs 2,900m

Dharma Sri Abeyratne

The Government has allocated Rs. 2,900 million to supply midday meals for one million schoolchildren studying in Grades 1 to 5, Education Minister Susil Premajayanthe said.

The allocation will be utilised to supply nutritious midday meals during this year.

The midday meal program commenced in 2006 on the advice of President Mahinda Rajapaksa after an investigation revealed in 2005 that 30 percent of schoolchildren came to school without having breakfast.

Besides a considerable number of students had suffered malnutrition and lacked proper nutrition, sources said.

Under these circumstances, the President had advised Educational officials to commence a nutrition program for schoolchildren.

Schoolchildren in grade 1 to 5 receive nutritious midday meals which could bring down the percentage of lower weight students by seven percent.

It has been reported that the daily attendance of schoolchildren has also increased as an indirect outcome of the prevailing nutrition program.

The program has now been carried out in 7,618 schools throughout the country. Around one million students are benefited from the program which exceeds 25 percent of the total number of schoolchildren. The Government had allocated Rs. 2,700 million for this nutrition program in 2009.

In addition to this program, a joint analysis is being conducted by the Education Ministry along with the Health and Nutritions Ministry aiming to look into the nutrition requirement of schoolchildren.