Paulina Quintso – The Education Director for the Municipality of Viqueque, Emilio Amaral said in the new school year of 2016-2017 the school feeding program has not yet been implemented because government funds have not yet been released.
He said that the Ministry of Education (ME) has supplied rice to the municipalities but the program itself is not running because funds to buy other produce are not yet available.
"We have rice but we don't have any other funds in the bank so we have not been able to implement the program," said Director Amaral by phone. He added that as soon as funds are available that the school feeding program will be run.
Meanwhile, Farol Basic School student Margareta Baptista said since she started school in 2016 that the school feeding program has not been implemented during breaks. "After we came back the school has not run the school feeding program so students have to buy their own food," she said.
She hopes the Ministry of Education will be able to build a proper kitchen in her school and also to be able to provide training for the cooks so they can prepare healthy food.
The Director General of the Ministry of Education Antoninho Pires said the school feeding program will start being implemented shortly. "This year we allocate almost $13 million to the school feeding program so that we can run it like we did last year," said DG Pires.