COVID-19: School Feeding Management Suspends All Cooking Activities By Caterers

The Management of the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) has suspended all cooking and feeding activities in all beneficiary schools across the country effective today Monday, March 16.

The Management has also postponed the planned Innovative Nutrition Initiative Training and Practical Cooking Demonstration for caterers of the Ghana School Feeding Programme in the Western and Western North Regions until further notice.

This follows the strict directive by the President Akufo-Addo yesterday March 15 suspending all public gatherings including conferences, funerals, church activities and schools among others as a result of the outbreak of the deadly Coronavirus (COVID-19) in parts of Ghana.

All the caterers are advised to adhere to the directives and help prevent the spread of the disease.

In strict adherence to the President’s directive, the National Coordinator of GSFP, Mrs. Gertrude Quashigah on the advice of the Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Mrs. Cynthia Mamle Morrison has accordingly recalled all Management and Staff who were already at Sefwi Wiaso in the Western Region on Sunday night (before the President’s announcement) back to Accra, as well as all training materials.

The School Feeding National Coordinator described as unfortunate and apologized to the caterers, all Regional Coordinating Councils, Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies, Ghana Education Service, Teachers and other District Stakeholders for any conveniences the suspension of school feeding activities due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 might have caused.

She said even though every necessary preparation had been made for the smooth commencement of the nutrition innovative training in the Western and Western North Regions from Monday March 16^th to Friday March 20^th, 2020, there was nothing she or the sector minister could do, since the President’s directive remains supreme.

According to Mrs Quashigah, the safety of the caterers, cooks, school children and staff of the Ghana School Feeding Programme and by extension the people of Ghana remains paramount.

She therefore appealed to the caterers to observe good hygiene, follow the education tips outlined by the Ghana Health Service, avoid needless human contacts, wash their hands frequently with soap under running water, provide hand sanitizers to prevent children from any possible infection and serve foods under certain temperature when permitted to resume cooking.

She also urged the caterers to adhere to school feeding standards of serving only hot and nutritious meal to the children. “All must adhere to the food hygiene techniques by keeping the food under certain temperature, must not use rotten ingredients, clean the cooking environment and apply safety measures”.

Mrs. Quashigah appealed to all stakeholders especially the donor partners to supply GSFP with eating bowls, spoons, enough soaps and hand sanitizers for supply to the children in this critical moment.

She commended the World Food Programme (WFP) who are the main sponsors of the training for remaining committed and supportive to GSFP over the years.

Meanwhile, the GSFP’s innovative nutrition initiative training and practical cooking demonstration has been organized for caterers and head cooks in other parts of the country including Upper West, Upper East, Northern, North East, Savannah, Bono, Bono East, Ahafo, Ashanti, Volta and Oti Regions.

The remaining regions include Western, Western North, Central, Eastern and Greater Accra regions.

The training is meant to equip the caterers and their head cooks with the requisite cooking skills to ensure well balanced and nutritious meals are served to the school children. It is also meant to add value to the use of the locally produced foodstuffs, increase food production and reduce the cost of cooking by the caterers so that they can break even.