MINISTER’s PRESS BRIEFING

The Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, (MoGCSP) Hon. Lariba Zuweira Abudu took her turn at the 2023 Edition of the Minister’s Press Briefing on Sunday 4th June, 2023 at the Ministry of Information.

The purpose was to mainly update the public on the payment of caterers’ arrears under the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) and also to highlight key achievements of the Ministry.

On updates on the Ghana School Feeding Programme, the Minister disclosed that the programme has seen a considerable growth and expansion from 1,671,777 beneficiaries in 2016 to 3,801,491 in 2023 in 10,832 public basic schools (KG to primary 6)

MoGCSP in collaboration with the Ministry of Finance has fully paid for the first and second term arrears of the 2022 academic year.

She assured caterers that their third term arrears of the 2022 academic year will be paid this week.

“11,052 caterers files have been cleared for payment” she disclosed.

Also, Hon. Lariba Abudu added that the cost per meal per child per day has been proposed as GHC 1.20; a proposal that will be fully advocated for its implementation.

To increase transparency and accountability in the programme, the Minister said a software has been developed to manage the GSFP data for real time reporting.

Touching on the achievements of the Ministry, Hon. Lariba indicated that the Affirmative Action Bill (AAB) has been submitted to the Cabinet for consideration and approval.

“It has been reviewed and being finalised” she noted.

She also mentioned that the Social Protection Bill/Aged Persons Bill and Disability Bill will soon be submitted to Cabinet for consideration and approval.

The Minister disclosed that MoGCSP in collaboration with its stakeholders organized 44 Sensitization programmes for 4,679 people in different communities across the country on Sexual and Gender Based Violence.

On issues with Disability, she said the Ministry has compiled data on 12,667 children with disabilities, 103 Graduates with disabilities from the Tertiary Institutions and 30 Graduates with disabilities from the Tertiary institutions having employable skills in the extractive sector.

She further disclosed that persons accused of witchcraft residing in the 5 ‘witch camps’ of the Northern and North East Region as well as persons affected by leprosy in the Weija Leprosarium and other other 5 located in Upper East, Upper West, Eastern, Volta and Central Regions have all been included in the LEAP Programme with their amount being doubled.

Source: MoGCSP