The Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) in collaboration with African Union Development Agency (AUDA), on March 8, trained some caterers in the programme as part of plans to build their capacities and empower them.

The event was held under the theme ’Celebrating Women and Empowering Communities Through Innovative Digital Tools for the Home-Grown School Feeding Programme’ at the Efua Sutherland Park in Accra.

The caterers were trained on how to maximise the use of locally produced foods, store foods in season and use specially designed meal planner software to create balanced meals for students.

In an interview with MyJoyOnline, a representative for AUDA-NEPAD, Mrs Kefilwe Moalisi said that “what we are trying to do as the African union development agency, is to promote what other farmers are producing, therefore creating a market for them to supply the schools and this will push for local production and consumption.”

“So today's theme is focused on innovative digital tools as well. So we are using a tool which is called the school newsletter to improve the quality of the existing school menus. The tool analyzes the existing menu,” she said.

Mrs Moalisi explained that in using the software “if we realize that the existing menu doesn't have enough iron, for example, the tool will tell us that, (so) we add more iron to what we actually are currently giving the children.”

She noted that the use of digitisation and other handy measuring tools will aid in preparing balanced dishes, avoiding food waste and supporting local farmers.

Addressing the participants, the Deputy Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Francisca Oteng Mensah lauded the AUDA-NEPAD, WFP and the GSFP for the efforts to acknowledge the roles and contributions of women in ensuring that children in deprived public basic schools are properly fed with nutritious meal on every school going day.

She was optimistic that, the caterers who had benefited from the training would use what they had learnt to impact their colleague caterers to enhance their cooking skills.

Also speaking to MyJoyOnline, the Deputy National Coordinator for the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) Secretariat, Kojo Abass Acquah, said that his outfit was thankful to AUDA-NEPAD for sponsoring the initiative.

“One of the basic objectives of the school feeding is to boost our cultural production in the catchment areas. Of late, we've realised that our Ghanaian children don't want to eat our local food. Everyday rice, so today we brought the caterers here to train them incentive new ways to use local products like soya beans and others,” he noted.

The National President of the School Feeding Caterers Association, Charlotte Asante, who was also present said that her colleagues were grateful for the training.

“This is the second time we are having a program like this and whenever we have a program, it is always different. This one has really taught us to preserve our foods, and use the skills acquired today even in our personal lives.”

Miss Asante added that “normally, we teach our children how to eat foreign food rather than eating our own food. But this program has taught me that we should encourage them even if they are not willing to eat because our local food has some rich food supplements and nutritional value that if we give it to our children, they can grow healthily.”