South Africa : Govt expands school nutrition programme to secondary schools

By Gabi Khumalo

Pretoria - As from next year, the Department of Education is to expand its school nutrition progamme to 1 500 secondary schools which fall in the category of the poorest of the poor.

The so-called "quintile one" school pupils will receive daily meals during school time to ensure they receive at least one decent meal per day so they can concentrate on their school work.

Currently, the department successfully runs school nutrition programmes in primary schools where the children rely heavily on the food they get at school.

Six million learners in 18 000 primary schools are benefiting from the programme which is funded through a conditional grant with a total budget of R1.5 million in 2008/09.

Addressing the media on the department's plans for the 2009 school year, Director General in the department, Duncan Hindle, said while the programme had been successfully implemented in the primary schools, the impact of high food prices had had an affect.

The cost of those basic staples which make up the backbone of the school nutrition programme have soared in the last year.

"The national Treasury has, however, responded positively with an inflation adjustment providing a slight increase in school meal costs in the current year," Mr Hindle said.

An amount of R1.3 million has been allocated to the programme for secondary schools in the quintile one category.

The department is hoping to expand the programme to secondary schools which have been categorised as quintile one and two schools by the year 2010.

Meanwhile, measures for the prevention and management of learner pregnancy have been made available to all public schools and have published the first two of the three series inserted to the Teacher newspaper called Genderations.

The department has also finalised and printed the guidelines for the prevention and management of sexual violence and harassment in public schools and they are being distributed to districts and high schools.

On the new Bill of Responsibilities, Mr Hindle reported that the department has received more that 2000 responses on the draft National Schools' Pledge with most of them being in favour of the pledge.

A new version of the pledge has been developed based on public opinion and is to be presented to the Minister of Education Naledi Pandor. "We'll take it to Cabinet hopefully early in the New Year," he said.

The new Bill of Responsibilities for the youth of South Africa, which will be taught in all schools as part of life orientation skills, was unveiled by the Ms Pandor in February.

The pledge is aimed at instilling a culture of respect and responsibilities among the youth.

The responsibilities that young people acknowledge in the Bill are to ensure the right to equality, human dignity, life, family or parental care, education, work, freedom and security of the person, own property, freedom of religion, belief and opinion, live in a safe environment, citizenship and freedom of expression.

Through the Bill, government wants to ensure that young people understand their rights and responsibilities.

Learners across the country will be expected to memorise the Bill and recite it each morning during assembly or in the classroom.

When it was unveiled in February, the pledge read as follows:

We the youth of South Africa
Recognising the injustices of our past,
Honour those who suffered and sacrificed for justice and freedom.
We will respect and protect the dignity of each person,
And stand up for justice
We sincerely declare that we shall uphold the rights and values of our Constitution
And promise to act in accordance with the duties and responsibilities
that flow from these rights.
! KE E: / XARRA // KE
Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika - BuaNews