Home Grown School Feeding Programme: A Survey of Implementation in Ube Schools in North Central Nigeria

Providing school meals is not just vital in nourishing the children, but also keeps them stronger and healthier as well as sustains the desire for quality education. The study investigated the implementation of Home-Grown School Feeding Programme in UBE schools in North Central Nigeria. Three research questions guided the study, and three hypotheses were tested. Descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. The population of the study comprised 169 respondents; (49 state officials and 120 local government desk officers from the 120 local government areas) in six states and FCT Abuja. The Census sampling technique was used to collect data from all the 169 respondents. Implementation of Home-Grown School Feeding Programme Questionnaire (IHGSFPQ) and Key Informant Interview were developed by the researchers and used for data collection. The instruments were validated by three experts in the Faculties of Education in Benue State University, Makurdi and Nasarawa State University, Keffi and the questionnaire was subjected to a pilot testing and analyzed using Cronbach Alpha to determine the internal consistency and reliability co-efficient which yielded 0.85. The data collected were analyzed using Mean and Standard Deviation to answer the research questions while Chi-square test of goodness-of-fit was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. To collaborate the findings from the questionnaire, the qualitative data were analyzed using simple percentages, tables, and bar charts. The study’s findings revealed that the amount of funds provided for Home-Grown School Feeding Programme is significant for its implementation in UBE schools in North Central Nigeria. The finding also revealed a significant number of food vendors recruited to implement the Home-Grown School Feeding Programme in UBE schools. Furthermore, the finding indicated that there is a significant level of monitoring and evaluation of the success of the Home-Grown School Feeding Programme in UBE schools. It was recommended among others that stakeholders including government agencies and international donors should prioritise increasing funding for the HGSFP to ensure sufficient provision of nutritious meals and necessary resources for its effective implementation.