The SFP has proven to be an effective tool for motivating children to return to school, with enrolment exceeding the initial project target by over 20% after years of disruption during the conflict period.

The World Food Programme (WFP) is implementing the SFP in partnership with Regional Education Bureaus and in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Labour, Ministry of Women and Social Affairs, and Ministry of Health.

The project reaches 123 schools across Afar, Amhara (77), and Tigray (27) regions.

Objectives

The project is implemented in alignment with the government’s SFP, which is embedded in various policies, strategies, and programmes such as the Social Protection Policy, Food and Nutrition Policy, National Nutrition Programme (NNP), School Health and Nutrition (SHN) Strategy, and the Education Sector Development Programme (ESDP IV–VI).

The objective of the project is to improve the provision of education specifically for conflict-affected children in Ethiopia. The specific objective is: 

• To reduce dropout rates in pre-primary and primary education in conflict-affected areas, with a special emphasis on the dropout rates of girls.

The project is transitioning from in-kind school feeding to a home-grown school feeding model. As a result, smallholder farmers’ associations, farmers, traders, and private entities along the food supply chain will benefit from both market access and capacity-building interventions to supply food to the programme.

Project Activities

• Provision of daily school meals for children.
• Formation of school feeding management committees.
• Training for regional and woreda education officials and school feeding management committees on food handling and the management of the school feeding programme.
• Training for cooks on food preparation and food handling.

Expected Results

• School meals are provided to 50,000 girls and boys affected by conflict and suffering from malnutrition. The WFP exceeded its target, reaching 61,461 schoolchildren (30,975 female).
• Training is provided to school management committees, woreda, and regional education bureaus on food handling and the management of the school feeding programme.
• Back-to-school community mobilisation interventions are supported.