Minister-Designate for Gender, Children, and Social Protection-designate, Naa Momo has indicated that the quality and timely supply of food in Senior High Schools (SHS) can be checked when headteachers purchase foodstuffs directly.Appearing before the Appointments Committee in Parliament on Wednesday, Naa Momo noted that decentralizing the School Feeding Programme will aid stakeholders monitor the state of food in schools.

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"Part of my life is local governance and it comes with decentralization and I believe that we are able to effectively decentralize the feeding programme as we are also looking at it will help to ensure that it is supplied on time the food items are supplied on time and then also keep an eye on the quality from the district level.

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"And so I will be glad to sit with all stakeholders involved to look at how this implementation will work out so that the beneficiaries have the best of it," she added.The School Feeding Programme under the Ghana National Buffer Stock Company (NAFCO) has been marred with challenges.

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NAFCO is a crucial contributor to the government's flagship program, Free Senior High School with 70 percent supply of foodstuffs to schools, while 30 percent of the food supplies are acquired by school administrators following the release of funds by the government.

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On occasions government is unable to release funds on time, headteachers are left with no choice but to procure supplies from alternative sources, settling the debt once the funds are made available.In order to end food shortages in schools, scores of Ghanaians called for its collapse during the tenure of the Akufo-Addo government to allow school authorities purchase food items without the interference of government.

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Meanwhile, president Mahama has pledged that feeding grants will be directed to the heads of Senior High Schools to manage the purchase of food for students.While speaking during his Building Ghana Tour in Kambatiak, North East Region, Mahama pledged to decentralize the process of sourcing food for Senior High Schools.“We are coming to decentralise the cooking of food for children and the procurement of food.

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The headmasters of the schools are going to be responsible for procuring food for the children. They are not going to sit and wait for National Buffer Stock to bring the food.

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"If we decentralise the procurement of food, the headmasters will be able to procure the food from the farmers in the area and they will be able to buy groundnuts, they will be able to buy beans, they will be able to buy vegetables so that the children can get a nutritious diet. And so the feeding grants should not go to Buffer Stock.

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The feeding grants should be paid directly to the secondary schools so that the headmasters can use the money and buy nutritious food for the children. And so we are going to make Free SHS better,” he added.

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