THE IMPACT OF YE ENAT WEG SCHOOL FEEDING PROGRAM ON SCHOOL PARTICIPATION AND DIETARY INTAKE OF CHILDREN IN ADDIS ABABA: THE CASE OF GULELE SUBCITY

Abstract

The school age is a very important phase in the life span of an individual with increased nutritional requirements to support growth and development. About 7 million school age children live in food insecure areas in Ethiopia. From this about 3 million are not attending school (Yohannes, 2017). Ye Enat Weg is a charitable association which is taking part in school feeding program at the ten sub cities of Addis Ababa since February 2015.The purpose of this study was to assess the impact of this program on school participation and dietary intake of the children in Gulele sub city which is one of the sub cities at which the program is being undertaken. Descriptive research design was employed for this study. The study used primary and secondary data sources. A total of 300 respondents were involved (260 beneficiary students and 40 key informants). Data collection tools were structured questionnaire for the beneficiary students in the selected five schools, Semi-structured interview and observation checklist. A Pre- test consisting of 15 individuals was done. Ten of them were beneficiary students. Two of them were teachers and three of them were women who prepared food. Qualitative data were transcribed and analyzed through thematic coding. Quantitative data were cleaned, coded, entered and analyzed using SPSS version 24. The findings were interpreted using literature review findings and other secondary data sources. Prominent effects of the project were significant enhancement in attendance, improvement in learning interest, partaking in tutorial improved, curricular and extracurricular activity participation advancement, income generating means for the women that prepare the meals, punctuality of the students increased, an additional food group was added, but no effect was seen on enrolment. Moreover, more than half of students who were under the program believed that the program needed an improvement. At the end the study suggests that Ye Enat Weg, schools and other governmental and nongovernmental organizations should work in collaboration to enhance the betterment of the program by involving all the responsible bodies including the beneficiaries of the program.