‘School meals to be institutionalised under broader education agenda’

Islamabad:State Minister for Federal Education and Professional Training Wajiha Qamar has affirmed the government’s commitment to institutionalising school meals as part of the broader education agenda.

“We must scale up programmes nationwide, learn from each other’s experiences and good practises to ensure that every child in Pakistan has access to a daily meal at school. This is not just a programme or a project, it is an investment in our children, our communities and our country’s prosperous future,” the minister told participants of a high-level national consultation on school meal programme here.

The event was organised jointly by the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training and the United Nations World Food Programme to advance coordinated efforts to implement school meal programmes across provinces.

The participants included federal and provincial education, health, planning and development and social protection officials as well as representatives from development agencies, private sector, academia and non-governmental organisations to advance the cause of ensuring every child in Pakistan has access to healthy, nutritious food at school.

The education minister said that investing in school meals was especially critical in the context of Pakistan. She said school meals offered a powerful, multi-sectoral solution, improving children’s nutrition and health, increasing school attendance, enhancing learning outcomes and easing the financial burden on low-income families.

"These efforts align closely with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s declaration of an education emergency last year and the urgent national priority to bring every out-of-school child into the classroom," she said.