School Nutrition Initiative

SCHOOL NUTRITION INITIATIVE

The National Nutritional Policy of Liberia states as their number one guiding principle:

“Adequate food, health and care for the vulnerable are universal human rights and primary to ensuring nutritional wellbeing for a full and active life of dignity for all human beings. The Government of Liberia acknowledges the role of nutrition as a precondition for sustainable social, economic and human development.”

Objectives

Provide a daily meal to over 400 vulnerable children at the Carolyn A. Miller School
Promote good nutrition practices and healthy living the Carolyn A. Miller School community
Support a community-based approach to dealing with child malnutrition, by relying on local expertise and resources as well as by engaging community members in the program
Develop a sustainable, cost-effective approach for school feeding in post-conflict Liberia

Impact of a daily meal

Allows the student to focus in class, thereby increasing learning capacity, and, ultimately, the quality of education
Relieves some of the pressure felt by families to provide food to their dependents on a daily basis
A daily meal also has the long-term benefit of preventing illness due to malnutrition, which enhances the overall quality of life of a child, as well as helps to prevent situations where families cannot afford medical treatment.

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About the School Nutrition Initiative

This initiative is the result of a partnership with Vision Awake Africa for Development (VAAFD), which runs the Carolyn A. Miller Elementary School (CAMES). CAMES was founded in 2003 with the mission to provide a tuition-free education for the neediest children living on the Buduburam Refugee Camp, as all other educational establishments in Buduburam had prohibitive tuition and other costs.

In 2009, Carolyn A. Miller Elementary School opened in Liberia! Over 600 students are already enrolled and receiving a free education. CAMES offers the only opportunity for the most underprivileged refugee children to have access to education and a genuine childhood.  

Many of these students are orphans or unaccompanied minors who were separated from their parents while fleeing the war. However, even families still left intact find it very difficult to feed their children on a regular basis, let alone pay for school tuition, supplies, and uniforms.  We are very proud to be a part of this initiative, and hope that you will join us in offering these children the daily meal that will help them grow to become empowered individuals.   For more information on CAMES and VAAFD, please visit: www.vaafd.org

Why a School Feeding Program?

The School Nutrition Initiative allows school children to receive the nutrients they need on a daily basis to ward off diseases and ill health. Many children come to school hungry; for some, the meal provided at school is the only one they can count on. The School Nutrition Initiative provides students with the incentive, motivation and energy necessary to take advantage of their education.

In 2007, The Niapele Project and VAAFD identified child malnutrition as a critical issue among the students of CAMES in Ghana, and we collaboratively designed an intervention to address it. In addition to intellectual and physical development issues, malnutrition also reduces school attendance, particularly among girls. Educators and teachers observed that students would often lack attention or fall asleep in class, due to lack of energy and adequate nutrition.

More broadly, two out of five Liberian children are growth-stunted and almost 20 percent are underweight. Anemia, vitamin A deficiency and low body weight are serious factors contributing to child and maternal morbidity and mortality.

In 2007-2008, the School Nutrition Initiative operated by The Niapele Project and VAAFD in the Buduburam refugee settlement proved to be a great tool in increasing attendance – both overall and for individual children, in addition to reducing severe malnutrition rates.

Developed in consultation with our nutrition consultant Adam Sandow, Assistant Nutrition Coordinator at St. Gregory's Catholic Clinic, the meals served in the Feeding Program were rice based with a "sauce" - vegetable stew (potato greens, beans, or cassava leaf) with fish. Each meal also included seasonal fruit as well as 500 mL of water.

This combination ensured that the meals that the children received offered all of the necessary micro and macro nutrients for proper physical and intellectual development, but also in the respect of traditional Liberian fare.

The meals are prepared and served by a cooking team made up of a Head Cook and three Assistant Cooks. The Team was certified to insure safety, and received nutrition and hygiene training from our nutrition consultant.

Download the SFP Impact Assessment Report - PDF

The School Nutrition Initiative in Liberia

After successfully running a tuition free school at Buduburam Refugee Settlement for many years, founder Karrus Hayes realized that repatriating refugees and other struggling Liberians were also in desperate need of a place CAMES. In September of 2009, CAMES Liberia opened in Paynesville, Liberia and currently welcomes nearly 400 students as a tuition-free school. Several teachers and staff members from the refugee camp made the move to CAMES Liberia, even some of the students from Ghana are now in attendence! As is the case with most of Liberia, there is extreme poverty in the area and students, teachers and staff, experience hunger on a daily basis.

The Niapele Project completed an assessment of needs and projected costs for relaunching the much needed School Nutrition Program in Liberia. A grant from the GO campaign is covering the one time start-up expense of $2,000. This grant financed everything needed to initiate the program, including benches and tables for the cafeteria space as well as stoves, pots, pans, bowls, spoons and water storage.

Relying on local expertise and resources

We source almost all of our food supplies from a local women’s agricultural co-op, Malaya. Through our purchase agreement with Malaya, we ensure that each meal served to the children of the Carolyn A. Miller School also contributes to supporting local agricultural production, as well as providing a much needed steady income for the women of Malaya.(read more here)
We work with a nutritionist from the University of Liberia and her students to certify meal composition, perform regular impact assessments and promote nutrition in the Carolyn A. Miller community.

Monitoring and Evaluation

Monitoring and evaluation are crucial aspects of the success of this initiative, and The Niapele Project is proud that our joint work with VAAFD has undergone regular, rigorous monitoring - this has allowed us to continually improve the program throughout implementation .

A nutrition consultant, and a team of assistants weigh and measure all students every term so that we can evaluate the progress of their physical development and the state of malnutrition among Carolyn A. Miller students.

We conduct a multidimensional analysis of the impact of the Feeding Program, by looking at grades, attendance and malnutrition rates among the students.

Aligning our objectives with Government priorities

Specific goals of the National Nutrition Policy of Liberia that are addressed by The Niapele Project’s School Nutrition Initiative are to reduce the prevalence of malnutrition including micronutrient deficiencies, to reduce the morbidity and effects of the double burden of malnutrition via susceptibility to other illnesses that encumber the struggling health care system, and to promote appropriate diet and lifestyles.

Issues of food security in Liberia are addressed through to our program’s focus on building local agricultural capacity within a community of small share local farmers. By guaranteeing a market and planning our monthly purchases, this agricultural cooperative is able to rely on a stable income and reinvest profits for increasing capacity. We also provide management and administrative training to assist Malaya, our suppliers, in strengthening their organization.