Lome — TOGO: The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has welcomed a contribution of EUR 11 million from the Government of Germany, facilitated by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The funding channelled through the German Development Bank (KfW), will enable WFP to provide daily nutritious meals to 28,000 pre-school and primary school children in the Kara and Savanes regions of northern Togo.

With Germany's funding, WFP will rehabilitate school kitchens, provide fuel-efficient stoves, establish school gardens and grain milling units, and support nutrition education to children, parents and teachers, ensuring a holistic approach to food security, health, and education.

"Through this collaboration with Germany, we are extending our activities to some of Togo's most vulnerable populations, building sustainable systems that connects local production with school feeding, creating a powerful cycle of development." said Dr Moïse BALLO, WFP's Country Director and Representative in Togo. "Our school feeding programme not only improves children's education and nutrition but also empowers local communities."

WFP will target 110 schools within communities hosting refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs), from the spillover of the Sahel crisis. Food commodities for school meals will be sourced locally from smallholder farmers and women's cooperatives, thereby stimulating the local economy.

"We are pleased to be able to work with WFP to make an important contribution to food security for children in a region that is affected by spillover of the Sahel crisis," said Dr. Claudius FISCHBACH, German Ambassador to Togo. "Germany is supporting Togo and the other states in the Gulf of Guinea through various measures in the areas of stability, social cohesion and development. It is particularly important to us that the chosen approaches can be continued in a sustainable way."

In collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and the Ministry of Agriculture and local organizations, WFP will provide agricultural inputs, equipment and technical training to 8,250 smallholder farmers and 1,000 members of food transformation cooperatives most of whom are women.

WFP's Home-Grown School Feeding programme in Togo targets 45,500 children in 160 primary schools in the northern regions of the country.