Mr Kofi Asare, Executive Director of Africa Education Watch (Eduwatch), says schools in some urban areas are benefiting from Government’s School Feeding Programme than those in deprived and rural areas.
He said this was because the criteria used to enrol schools onto the programme did not align with the country’s poverty index to determine which districts or areas needed it the most. “The school feeding programme is supposed to be targeted at poor people who are malnourished, and who poverty and hunger could be a barrier to accessing basic education.”
“However, we have observed that some districts like Ga West which is ranked 21 on the poverty index has over 90 per cent of its schools on the programme; whereas a district like Tatale-Sangule, ranked about 240 has only 17 per cent of its schools on the programme,” he added. Mr Asare disclosed this during his presentation on findings from a review of the Education Sector Medium-Term Development Plan (ESMTDP 2022-2025).
The study was conducted in 14 districts, made up of seven endowed areas and seven deprived areas. The event organised by Eduwatch together with its partners brought together stakeholders in the education sector to assess the sector’s performance over the three-year period. Mr Asare said from their findings, 35 per cent of endowed basic schools benefit from the programme as against 24 per cent in deprived areas. He stressed that targeting must strictly be aligned with the multi-dimensional poverty index, which was a credible barometer for gauging the distribution of poverty, so not to end up feeding those who would be able to access education without feeding, but those who were likely to drop out or not go to school due to the lack of food.
Mr Asare said their study established that there was a growing inequality in basic schools infrastructure and projects distribution between endowed districts and deprived ones. He said they observed that Government did a “straight jacket” infrastructure and projects distribution without considering the peculiar challenges and specific needs of schools. Mr Asare urged authorities to formulate an infrastructure policy that would not only address the issue of infrastructure financing, but also infrastructure maintenance. He said the policy should redefine school infrastructure, to include the school building, furniture for teachers and pupils, teacher accommodation, WASH facilities and ICT infrastructure.
“If we don’t do this, by 2030, we would have attained high levels of enrolment or retention at the national level. But in deprived areas, you will find that we have up to 20 per cent gap in completion attainment or transition attainment between primary school and junior high school, simply because infrastructural issues were not addressed equitably,” he added. Meanwhile, data was gathered in 14 purposively sampled districts representing both deprived and endowed areas.
The districts covered were Nkwanta South, Zabzugu, Tatale Sanguli, Tain, Bongo, Nabdam, Ejura Sekyedumase, Obuasi East, Ejisu, Adenta, Ga East, Ledzokuku, Ga West, and La-Nkwantanang Madina, which spanned six regions – Ashanti, Bono, Greater Accra, Oti, Northern and Upper East.
Souce: GNA
