THE UNITED NATIONS WORLD FOOD

Published purpose

This project aims to save lives, alleviate suffering, and maintain human dignity where people do not have access to safe, nutritious and sufficient food. This project is one of a number of Canada's contributions to the United Nations World Food Programme’s (WFP) school feeding program. Over the past four decades, WFP has become the world's foremost provider of school meals to poor children. In addition to providing free midday meals, WFP provides students with take-home rations for the family, which encourages parents to send their boys and girls to class. School feeding initiatives target the most food-insecure areas of countries with low school enrolment, irregular school attendance, and high primary school drop-out rates. Canada's support to WFP's school feeding program is used to purchase, deliver and distribute nutritious food primarily to school children, particularly girls, as a means of increasing enrolment and attendance rates, decreasing drop-out rates, as well as improving children's concentration, learning and academic performance.