Olumide Lawal
The Federal Government has released N844, 360, 550 to seven states for commencement of National Homegrown School Feeding Programme to cater for more than one million primary school pupils across the states.
The states that has received money as at last week to begin the scheme includes, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, Oyo, Osun, Ogun and Zamfara.
The Senior Special Assistant on Media & Publicity to the President, Laolu Akande, made the disclosure on Monday by while briefing newsmen on the Social Investment Programme of the Buhari administration.
According to him, while funds have been released to the seven States to kick off the programme, not all of them have actually started the implementation as at press time.
In the States of Anambra, Enugu, Osun, Ogun, and Oyo, the feeding has actually started, while it is expected to start this week in the two other states of Ebonyi and Zamfara, that have been funded already.
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.
Meanwhile, of all the States, Anambra, which was the first state to receive FG 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.
Also, in Ebonyi, FG has also released a total of N115, 218, 600, while 1466 cooks have been engaged and 164, 598 pupils are to be fed, while Enugu State, has received N67,244, 800 to feed 96, 064 pupils and 1128 cooks engaged.
In Ogun State, FG has released N119, 648, 900 to feed 170, 927 pupils and engage 1381 cooks, while in Osun  N92, 425, 400 has been released to feed 142, 193 pupils with 2688 cooks engaged.
For Oyo State, a total of N72, 288, 300 have been released by the FG to feed 103, 269 pupils, engaging 1437  cooks, while in Zamfara the  FG has released N188, 765, 500 to feed 269, 665 pupils and engage 2, 738 cooks.
