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The Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) in partnership with the Hershey Company, is to pilot the Energizing Learning Nutrition Project to provide pupils enrolled under the GSFP initiative with groundnut supplement.

The Energizing Learning Nutrition Project, which would be piloted in the Northern and Ashanti Regions for two years, aims to supplement the meals of 50,000 pupils to 100,000 pupils with a daily fortified groundnut snack.

The goal of the project is to improve the nutritional content of school lunches, helping to reduce hunger and malnutrition, as well as to boost domestic food production and the security of rural farmers.

The project would invest in increasing the quantity and improving the quality of locally grown groundnuts to meet food safety quality standards, while Hershey would process the groundnut at its Kumasi Factory into paste and supply to pupils as snacks after their school meals.

Mr Seidu Adamu, the National Coordinator of GSFP, who spoke at the launch of the project at Tamaligu in the Karaga District of the Northern Region, on Monday, said it would help to arrest malnutrition amongst children, which was one of the objectives for implementing the GSFP.

Mr Adamu said the GSFP was not merely to feed school children but to reduce poverty and ensure food security, explaining the new project would create market for groundnut farmers across the country.

He emphasised the need for all to eat locally produced food to help lift the country out of poverty and improve the incomes of farmers.

Mr Imoro Yakubu, the District Chief Executive for Karaga, said the project would positively impact the lives of groundnut farmers and urged all partners to work hard to ensure its success.

Mr Yakubu called encouraged development organisations to support the project to expand it across the country to enable more pupils to benefit.

Mr Mike Wege, the Chief Administrative Officer of Hershey Company, said the decision to partner with GSFP to implement the project was to build on the success of Hershey to support the education of children in Ghana.

Naa Yakubu Andani Abdulai, the Chief of Tamaligu described the project as refreshing news as it would boost the nutrition status of pupils as well as support groundnut farmers.

Hershey is the leading manufacturer of chocolate and confectionary products in the United States, and a major purchaser of cocoa from West Africa. It works in partnership with the Ghana Cocoa Board to improve farmer livelihoods.