The Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development (FMHADMSD) Sadiya Umar Farouq has engaged 200 National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members to conduct an enumeration exercise to capture One Million, One Hundred and Thirteen (1,133,000) pupils across primary schools in Bauchi State under the Home Grown School feeding Programme (NHGSFP). Engaging the stakeholders and the corps members as enumerators is the most innovative way to manage the National Social Investment Program (NSIP), especially the National Home-Grown School Feeding Program (NHGSFP). “We have resolved that having the biometric data of all the beneficiaries of this program would create an avenue for better program planning. “Implementation would create more room for enlisting more beneficiaries. This would also foster transparency and accountability in line with government regulations.
The stakeholders include; the National Bureau of Statistics, Ministry of Education, National Orientation Agency, National Population Commission. Others are National Youth Service Corps, UBEC, state Education Board are all jointly working closely to verify the existing numbers of beneficiaries on the Programme and update the record for better effectiveness.
The representative of the Honourable Minister, who also doubled as the Team Lead of the Programme in Bauchi State, Gidado Garba Abubakar of the the Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development (FMHADMSD) said that the enumeration programme is aimed at ascertaining the actual number of the beneficiaries of the programme in the State.
He assured that the programme will continued to be funded by the Ministry as long as the administration remains in power, calling on the Officials designated to for the running of the programme to synergize for its success. Continuing he said the beneficiaries will be known statistically to improve the quality of food that will be served the pupils.
Earlier the Special Adviser to the Bauchi State Governor on NSIP, Hajjiya Amina Katungm at the Stakeholders engagement on enumeration of beneficiaries and scaling up of the school feeding programme in Bauchi, said that the enumeration is expedient in order to ascertain the number of the beneficiaries of the programme, to ensure adequate supply of food items in the state. She said the that the programme has suffered some set backs in the past due to inadequate statistics that made it difficult to ascertain the numbers of beneficiaries in all the schools, that the enumeration exercise will remove the bottlenecks militating against the success of the programme, urging the stakeholders to cooperate with the official to make the programme a huge success.
Adeyemo Felicia
Chief Information Officer
For: DD (Information)