Food for Education Foundation

The elevate price will be a catalyst in advancing sustainable feeding programs, addressing the nutritional problem that has impacted millions of children limiting Africa’s full potential and the ability of youth to thrive. By investing in a young African woman, nutritionist founder, the elevate price fund will be a powerful investment in feeding the future of Africa.

Our team is innovative, credible, woman led and has so far provided over 5 million meals that have improved the nutritional status of children in urban and peri-urban areas in Kenya. The model solution has the potential to scale and feed millions of children unleashing their potential to lead the world.

The journey of Food for Education begun as a passion project back in 2012, as I was pursing nutrition and food science at the University of South Australia. In my first year of studies, the reality of malnutrition among children and the devastating effects on their future and quality of life was daunting. Statistics have shown that stunted children grow up to earn 22% less than non-stunted children, while non-stunted children have a 33% chance of getting out of poverty compared to children who are stunted.

Millions of vulnerable children have also had their long-term health, development and well-being thrown into jeopardy because they have missed out on nutritious meals. The last ten years have seen a growing global consensus that school feeding programmes generate a lasting impact that can shape the future of a nation.
Food for Education aims to provide nutritious, high quality and affordable meals that will improve the health and educational outcomes. Currently, providing 33,000 meals to children in public primary schools in urban and peri-urban areas in Kenya, we purpose to provide 1 million meals per day by 2025, a step to eliminating classroom hunger and giving vulnerable children a better chance in life.

41% of Africa’s population are primary school going children with studies showing that 257 million of the population experience extreme hunger. In Kenya, 1 in every 4 children is stunted, with 51% of the population being food insecure and 46% living in extreme poverty. Chronic and acute under-nutrition and micronutrient deficiencies continue to be a persistent critical issue in many regions in Africa, due to low food production and broken food systems. Hungry children cannot grow or learn. Hunger has detrimental effects on their health, school performance and ability to learn, subsequently hindering productivity and potential.

Food for Education provides affordable, high quality, nutritious meals to urban and semi-urban public primary school children with the aim of improving nutrition and education outcomes; giving them the opportunity to break out of the poverty cycle. We provide the most affordable school meals in Kenya delivered through smart operations, logistics and technology. We are Africa’s most innovative and sustainable school feeding programme that engages parents, government and communities to provide essential food for school children which has proven to have tremendous impact in their education.

Food for Education has served over 5 million meals that have improved nutrition and education outcomes. Starting from feeding 25 children in one school, we currently provide 33,000 daily school meals regionally and are the largest centrally run school feeding programme in East Africa. Through efficiency in sourcing, production and distribution, we leverage multiple stakeholders from smallholder farmers to governments to deliver impact at scale. Through our Tap2Eat technology, a cashless payment system, parents are able to pre-pay for meals, track their children’s dietary intake and monitor school attendance. The hub and spoke model allows quality check through standardization in the preparation methods, low-cost efficiency, by taking advantage of economies of scale and effective distribution to a wider geographical area through elaborate logistics. We have adopted a home-grown strategy that encourages sourcing from local farmers, thus creating stable markets for local economies, thereby enriching the community as a whole. Our model creates a blueprint for replication of school feeding across Africa with the finances and logistics of sourcing, preparing, and distributing fresh food addressed with local input.

Our goal is to ensure that we improve educational outcome through nutritious and affordable meals that help children in school. Hungry children cannot grow and learn thus the urgent need to address classroom hunger. Compelling research over decades has shown that school feeding programs are an effective tool to promoting access to education, as measured by indicators such as; enrolment, attendance, and retention which contributes to improved learning and academic achievement. Properly designed school meals improve health outcomes by addressing macro and micro nutrients deficiencies. A Cost-Benefit-Analysis tool developed jointly by WFP & the Boston Consulting Group established that every dollar invested in Kenyan school feeding programmes returns between US$6.35 and US$8.79. Each child lives longer and healthier hence becomes more productive as a working adult.  To date, Food for Education has served over 5 million meals and is working towards ensuring that vulnerable children are healthy, and have improved educational outcomes that will help them have a better chance in life. As we plan to scale, we target to provide 1 million meals per day by 2025, a step closer to achieving hunger-free classrooms across Africa.