RATIN

Government to give schools food.

Posted on February, 23, 2017 at 11:05 am


Schools  to get free food.

The government is set to distribute free food to schools in different districts affected by the prolonged dry spell across the country. Addressing Parliament recently, Vincent Ssempijja the agriculture Minister told legislators that because of prolonged dry spell, the population that needed food relief had increased to 1.3 million people in November 2016 to 1.58Million people in January 17.

It is against this backdrop that the Mps demanded the government’s intervention to save the population from dying through provision of food relief.

Every district, especially those hit by food insecurity will receive food for schools. The food will be given to the districts and they will do the distribution because they know where hunger is biting the most. Dr Ruhakana Rugunda the Prime Minister said.

Speaking during a plenary session on Tuesday, Rugunda who is also the leader of Government business in Parliament told the House that the Government is mobilizing more food resources to provide food relief to hunger stricken districts in the country.

Additional resources will be mobilized and the House will be informed accordingly. We want to strengthen our national capacity to fight food insecurity, Rugunda said. Recently Ssempijja told the Parliament that 52.5b had been proposed to provide food for vulnerable households for a period of three months. (February to May 2017) adding that so far shs 10b has been released.

Briefing parliament on the action plan by the Government to mitigate food insecurity and disaster situation in the country, ssempijja noted that the majority of Ugandans in 88 districts across the country were surviving on one meal or half a meal a day. He said out of the 116 districts in the country, only 28 districts were fairly food secure with 65% of the population in Karamoja sub- region facing a food crisis

 

New Vision, Thursday, February 23, 2017 Page 4 Story by Henry Sekanjako and Moses Mulondo