Eighteen months after the Federal Government suspended the National Home Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP), uncertainty continues to hang over its fate despite a ₦160 billion allocation in the 2025 budget. Millions of schoolchildren, local farmers, vendors, and cooks remain stuck in a cycle of stalled policy, unfulfilled promises, and growing economic hardship.
The NHGSFP was introduced under former President Muhammadu Buhari as part of efforts to combat child malnutrition, improve school enrolment, and stimulate rural economies. The initiative aimed to provide one nutritious meal per day to primary school pupils while boosting local agriculture by sourcing food from smallholder farmers and empowering women-led food vendor networks.
At its peak, the programme fed over nine million pupils in 52,604 public schools across 30 states, employing 34,869 cooks and indirectly supporting more than 250,000 individuals, including farmers, vendors, and aggregators. However, it was abruptly suspended in January 2024 following allegations of financial mismanagement involving the National Social Investment Programme Agency (NSIPA).
The fallout was swift. President Bola Tinubu suspended NSIPA’s Chief Executive Officer, Halima Shehu, and later, the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Dr. Beta Edu, amid mounting concerns over widespread irregularities in the administration of social investment programmes. Although a panel was set up to review the NHGSFP, no official relaunch plan has been communicated more than a year and a half later.
Despite the allocation of ₦160 billion in the 2025 budget—₦100 billion under the Service Wide Vote and another ₦60 billion earmarked for the Ministry of Education—the scheme remains inactive. Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun, had in July 2024 reassured the House of Representatives Committee on Alternative Education of the government’s commitment to restart the programme. Yet, no concrete action has followed.
Meanwhile, inflation continues to erode the programme’s viability. The current ₦100 per child meal allowance—raised from ₦70 in 2023—is now inadequate. According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), food inflation hit 40.53 percent in April 2024, up from 24.45 percent in March 2023. A 50kg bag of rice, which cost ₦26,000 in early 2023, now sells for over ₦85,000. Garri rose from ₦18,000 to ₦45,000 per bag, while the price of an egg surged from ₦50 to ₦250.
Analysts estimate that feeding 10 million children now requires over ₦540 billion annually, triple the current budget allocation. The longer the delay in restarting the programme, the more expensive and unsustainable it becomes.
In states like Kano, the programme’s absence is already taking a toll. In 2023, over 1,300 pupils reportedly dropped out of schools in Kiru, Garko, and Minjibir Local Government Areas following interruptions in the feeding scheme. Though these figures predate the nationwide suspension, they reflect growing structural weaknesses and funding inconsistencies that plagued state-level implementation.
The economic ripple effect is also visible. Thousands of cooks, food vendors, and farmers previously engaged in the scheme have lost income, pushing many deeper into poverty. In July 2024, Hon. Muktar Umar Zakari, a member of the House of Representatives from Kano State, moved a motion urging the Federal Government to revisit the NHGSFP. He warned that its continued suspension could lead to a spike in school dropouts, child malnutrition, rural unemployment, and insecurity.
Questions around accountability have also overshadowed the programme’s credibility. In 2020, the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) uncovered that ₦2.67 billion allocated for school feeding in Unity Schools during the COVID-19 lockdown had been diverted into private accounts. The scandal triggered public outcry and cast doubt on the transparency of NSIPA’s operations.
Calls for reform have since intensified. Stakeholders, including the Parent-Teacher Association (PTA), Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT), and civil society organisations, have demanded more robust oversight and inclusion in the scheme’s governance structure. Many argue that without institutional transparency and stakeholder involvement, restarting the programme without reform would simply repeat past failures.
Beyond financial mismanagement, the human cost is alarming. According to UNICEF, Nigeria currently has the highest number of out-of-school children globally, estimated at 20.2 million as of 2023. Experts warn that without school meals, pupils—particularly in rural and low-income areas—face higher risks of malnutrition, absenteeism, and dropout. These trends threaten Nigeria’s progress toward achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4, which aims to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all.
With no timeline for resumption, escalating costs, and growing disillusionment, the NHGSFP sits at a critical crossroads. For millions of children and families across Nigeria, the stakes are more than just nutritional—they are developmental.
