Last week, during the celebration of the 4th African Day of School Feeding on 1st March, African Union Member States approved the official communiqué of the event, with key recommendations to advance home-grown school feeding in the African continent. The official ceremony took place in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, with 320 participants representing multiple sectors and 23 Member States, including 13 ministers and deputy ministers.
The theme of the event was “The Year of Refugees, Returnees and Internally Displaced Persons: Towards Durable Solutions to Forced Displacement in Africa”. The Member States recognized that home-grown school feeding initiatives contribute to the humanitarian-peace-development nexus due to their social protection effects. They are also a crucial tool for African countries to achieve the Agenda 2063, by empowering communities to ensure that all children, specially girls, can access education from early childhood to completion of secondary level.
In the communiqué, participants stressed the importance of the home-grown school feeding approach. School feeding, when relying on home-grown food chains, supports children to have adequate and more nutritious meals and at the same time promotes inclusive growth and rural development. School feeding programmes provide a steady market for smallholder farmers products and boost local economies.
School Feeding Cluster
During the celebrations, the Continental Home-Grown School Feeding Cluster official instruments were launched: Terms of Reference, Strategy, and Reporting Mechanisms. The Cluster’s instruments counted on the coordination role and technical support of the WFP Centre for Excellence in Brazil, WFP Africa Office and WFP Country Office in Côte d’Ivoire. Hard copies were distributed to participants.
A report of the African Union annual survey on the progress of Member States in school feeding was presented. The survey shows a significant increase in the number of children benefiting from school feeding programmes and in the involvement of local communities.
Key messages
The communiqué stresses that the School Feeding Cluster is a useful platform to ensure partnerships and collaboration among all key-stakeholders and to facilitate experience sharing. It is an entry point for all Member States to present their needs for partners and to share and search for information in school feeding programmes. The Cluster will interact with initiatives in the continent, such as the recently created Centre of Excellence against Hunger in Cote d’Ivoire.
The document also highlights the need for more investments in national school feeding programmes and points out that governments and partners need to work together to establish innovative finance mechanisms. The importance of partnerships to keep advancing school feeding in the continent and the role of South-South dialogue and networks in supporting countries to move forward were also emphasised. Participants also made a set of recommendations for Member States (see recommendations below).
Key recommendations
• Member States need to link the School Feeding Cluster strategy with their national strategies to facilitate coordinated continental experience sharing.
• All African governments should be urged to ensure effective implementation of Home-Grown School Feeding in their respective countries. Member States need to work towards allocating significant budgets to school feeding in order to strengthen national ownership and control.
• Member states are encouraged to provide feedback to the annual surveys and submit reports on the progress of implementation of Home-Grown School Feeding at the country level. Which will be taken to the heads of state summit. A report will be produced annually by the cluster.
• Considerable emphasis should be given to communication and advocacy, highlighting the huge importance of Home-Grown School Feeding programmes.
• Continental and regional initiatives and platforms should be created and sustained for sharing experiences and peer learning.
• Strengthen involvement of multiple partners in national HGSF Programmes, including key UN Agencies such as UNESCO, UNICEF, WFP and FAO, as well as Civil Society, Community-Based Organisations and Private Sector.
• The African Union Commission is requested to follow-up on the implementation of the recommendations in this and the previous Communiqués, in consultation with the key Development Partners and through the School Feeding Cluster.
Download the Communiqué in English
Download the Communiqué in French
