The Ghana National Education Campaign Coalition (GNECC) has attributed the shortage of food in various Senior High schools across the country to debt owed to the National Food Buffer Stock Company.
The coalition has, therefore, urged duty bearers to expedite actions in finding solutions to the situation.
Earlier, there were reports of food shortage in some senior high schools which compelled authorities to serve students breakfast without bread and sugar.
Subsequently, the Minister of Education, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum, met with the leadership of the Conference of Heads of Assisted School to find lasting solutions to the problem.
But in a statement, the GNECC blamed the current situation on the non-payment of arrears due to the National Food Buffer Stock Company Limited.
“The non-payment of arrears to the National Food Buffer Stock Company Limited to send food to Senior High Schools is to be blamed for the current situation. To overcome these difficulties, GNECC urges the government to pay the National Food Buffer Stock Company Limited to enable remedy the dire food shortages in the schools.”
“Our investigation also reveals that release of feeding grants to the special schools has not been regular. We, therefore, call on the Ministry of Education and Ghana Education Service to ensure the timely release of feeding grants for the effective running of the Special Schools.
“Finally, we believe with proper planning, situations like these should not repeat themselves because of the negative impact it has on teaching and learning,” part of the statement read.
Meanwhile, the spokesperson of the Education Ministry, Kwasi Kwarteng has assured us that foodstuff is going to be distributed.