Rwanda’s National School Feeding Programme has expanded rapidly within very few years. Based on the National Comprehensive School Feeding Policy of 2019, the programme provides hot meals to all students in all public or government-supported pre-primary, primary and secondary schools since 2020. By 2023, the programme is expected to reach more than 4 million students. The Government has constantly increased the funding for this programme, both to keep pace with increasing student numbers, but also by increasing its share of contributions in pre-primary and primary schools, relieving parents correspondingly. The programme is expected to yield significant benefits for students and their households, but also for local farmers and economies, and the national as a whole. Some of these benefits maybe only materialise in many years, when students have acquired better and longer schooling and are becoming more productive than they would have been without school feeding. Other benefits, by contrast, will be almost immediate. This is the case for local farmers, agriculture and food systems, in particular if the stable and local demand of the school feeding programme is complemented by additional supply-side support to food systems actors. Another immediate benefit of the programme is the creation of thousands of jobs throughout the entire country, be it for cooks, for food suppliers, or processors and service providers along the supply chain. Not least, an important immediate benefit includes the relief of households from the costs of the meals provided at schools – which in particular for poor households can mean a significant increase of their available income, which they then can invest into their livelihoods and resilience. The Updated National School Feeding Strategy provides clear guidance on how all of these benefits can be materialized in a cost-efficient way. The present Financing Strategy complements the School Feeding Strategy by showing how the programme can be financed.
Health and Education Resource Centre