DILI, 15 june 2021 (TATOLI)- The Government of Timor-Leste and all development partners under that United Nation (UN) signed an agreement letter to support nutritive foods through the School feeding program for Timorese children.
This program is aimed to help increase children’s nutrition and ensure children have a healthy life and to be able to access school.
The Prime Minister of Timor-Leste, Taur Matan Ruak accompanied by Minister of Education, Youth and Sports, Armindo Maia and United Nation Coordinator in Timor-Leste, Roy Trivedy signed the an agreement letter and this ceremony is held in PCM conference room, at government palace, this wednesday.
The signature ceremony were attended by representatives of other UN organizations in TL such as, the World Food Program (WFP), Dageng Liu; World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, Bilal Aurang Zeb Durrani; Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Paula Lopes da Cruz.
“To achieve the national action goal the government of Timor-Leste has committed to renewing this agreement to provide children with nutritive foods. This program is to help the government of Timor-Leste combat hunger and malnutrition,” Prime Minister Taur said in a speech at the event.
According to Prime Minister Ruak, this agreement focused on efforts to support school feeding programs and foods containing nutrition and healthy meals for children to consume. It is an adequate program that can ensure everyone lives a healthy life.
Ruak added that the School feeding program certainly contributes to reducing absenteeism and dropout rates, as well as intensifying national production of healthy, nutritious, biological, and environmentally friendly food products.
UN Coordinator in TL, Roy Trivedy thanked the TL Government for its strong commitment to address the issue of food security and nutrition for all people in TL. With this signature of this very important document, the UN reaffirmed TL’s commitment for the decisions against these problems.
“We are very happy that the Prime Minister and the Minister of Education signed a commitment to support schools with nutritive foods for children. This school feeding program is most important for this country because after the pandemic children are bored to return to school and this program encourages them to go back to school and they can reactivate the learning process,” said Roy.
The United Nations and other development partners are honorable and privileged to take part in decisions and agreements that have been signed.
The Minister of Education, Armindo also said that the School feeding program program since 2016 has been fully handled by the Ministry of State Administration but with the assistance of the Ministry of Education to ensure the quantity and quality of food for children.
“We want to ensure that the food provided to children is safe and contains nutrition. Thus, the school feeding program is completely handled by the Ministry of State Administration,” said Armindo.
Journalist: José Belarmino de Sá
Editor: Rafy Belo
