Prime
Government revives mandatory milk plan for schools
Vendors pour milk into coolers for preservation in Mbarara District in 2018. PHOTO | FILE
What you need to know:
- The blueprint to cover the estimated 15 million learners is projected to grow domestic milk uptake by 2-3 billion litres a year, but without clarity on who will pick the bills, private schools proclaimed the arrangement a non-starter, writes Tonny Abet & Lydia Felly Akullu
The government has revived plans to make milk mandatory on schools’ menu following a year-long piloting of the programme at 128 schools in south-western Uganda with support from Dutch organisation, SNV.
A second phase of the piloting, dubbed parents-led, is ongoing at 87 educational institutions in Kampala metropolitan.
The government initially unveiled the plan more than a year ago, but it was met with resistance by parents who called it an unnecessary new spend at a time most families are struggling to afford one meal a day.
Dr Samson Akankiza, the acting executive director of Dairy Development Authority (DDA), told this publication in two separate interviews – last Tuesday and yesterday – that they are evaluating multiple options to pick the most feasible.
The compulsory milk provision is a sub-component of a broader school feeding programme whose draft policy is reportedly being scrutinised by technocrats to ensure it does not contradict or duplicate existing laws, policies or Uganda’s international commitments.
Dr Akankiza argued that the programme is essential to address issues of poor nutrition among children and to stabilise farm gate milk prices as the country grapples with an export market made volatile by some neighbours’ protectionist practices.
Kenya has since start of last month reportedly not granted export permits to Ugandan milk exporters, leaving affected processors with an equivalent 23 million litres of processed milk.
Nairobi officially denies imposing any non-tax barriers, which would offend market protocols that East African Community leaders have inked to facilitate free movement of goods and services between member states.
“[The] school milk-feeding programme is part of the national policy on school feeding,” said Dr Akankiza, “This will look at the government’s intervention in terms of putting capitation grants to accommodate dairy products and others.”
There are an estimated 15 million learners across different educational tiers in the country, but the plan is to roll the programme to initially benefit nursery and primary school pupils and secondary students before universities and tertiary institutions can be considered.
Proponent project that once in place, the programme will grow domestic milk consumption by 2.2 billion litres a year, theoretically making learners healthier with better nutrition and farmers with better lined pockets from stable farm gate prices happier.
“We are looking at three strategies to implement the programme: parent-led within private institutions and government-led within government-aided schools and in between, the processor gives a special package for schools at a subsidised rate,” Dr Akankiza said in response to our question on who will pick the bills.
A National Steering Committee chaired by DDA and with representations from the ministries of Education, Health, Trade, Agriculture and development partners has been put in place to thrash out details of the broader school feeding programme.
Other members include the United Nations food agency, the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), SNV and milk processors, among them, Amos Dairy Ltd, Pearl Dairy Farms Ltd, Brookside and JESA Farm Dairy Ltd.
“Milk processors … are in agreement with us on the plan to provide products at subsidised price. Of course, they want to sell because this opens up a new market for them. This is open to all licenced milk processors,” Dr Akankiza added.
Technocrats have drafted two framework documents - the school (milk) feeding programme and the milk domestic consumption strategy – that are currently being scrutinised by government technocrats and line ministers pending Cabinet consideration.
Blueprint
The blueprint detail innovative approaches and broader frame for the plans intended to significantly boost milk uptake at home.
Maj Gen David Kyomukama, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, confirmed revival of the school milk-feeding programme but said implementation will depend on the availability of funds to bankroll the scheme at especially government-aided schools.
“[The] government has plans to give at least one litre of milk per day to each school-going child. That implies 15 million litres per day because there are 15 million children going to school. That goes to about 3 billion litres of milk per year,” he said.
Earlier more conservative estimates of 2.2 billion litres were based on the fact that learners on average spend 8 or nine months a year at school, depending on whether the institutions follow term or semester system, officials involved in the planning said of the computational disparity.
In yesterday’s telephone interview, the PS said that “let us solve the problem of budget one by one, but it [the school milk-feeding programme] is coming”.
Official were careful not to set a timeline of implementation, although insiders said technocrats were working to have drafts of the required policy documents ready by the end of this month, pending their consideration by political executives.
We were unable to establish whether money has been provided in the 2023/24 Financial Year budget, due to be read on Thursday, for the milk-feeding project.
DDA’s Akankiza said for the start, they plan to have every child consume 200 millilitres of packaged milk day, costing a parent/guardian or the tax payers’ Shs800.
This, he noted, will mean a contribution of Shs72,000 per learner or Shs1 trillion for all the 15 million learners per a term that normally runs for three months.
However, Mr Hasadu Kirabira, the chairperson of the National Private Educational Institutions Association (NPEIA), said the programme is not feasible in the country.
“The ministry of Education undertook a project on feeding the school learners including private schools and through the study conducted, it was proved beyond reasonable doubt that the project could not work especially when it involves schools requesting parents to pay money,” he said.
He added: “It had many gaps. It could be used by many schools to request for money from parents; so, we are looking at it as something that would not help schools.”
The Headteacher of Entebbe Secondary School, Ms Ruth Menda, said some schools had embraced the programme but they are using different approaches. “For secondary schools, we are putting the milk in our canteens. And the students in some schools are buying it from the canteens [for] those who have the money but not really the school coming in to invest in the money,” she said.
Ms Menda’s school is already in preliminary conversation with milk processors to stock the school canteen from where affordability for students will boil down to whom has money and who does – an inequality the policy thinkers aimed to cure with the universal feeding scheme.
