The Bauchi State Government has begun the enumeration exercise of 1.1 million pupils to scale up implementation of the Federal Government’s National Home Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP) in the state.
Hajiya Amina Katagum, Special Adviser to Gov. Bala Mohammed, on Social Investment Programme (N-SIP), stated this at the inauguration of the electronic enrollment exercise, on Thursday in Bauchi.
Katagum said the three-week exercise would be conducted across the 20 local governments of the state, to generate quality data for the programme
She expressed optimism on the proposed scale-up of the programme, adding that community mobilisation was ongoing to mobilise participation and compliance of the exercise.
“The enumeration is conducted by the Federal Ministry of Humanitarian, Disaster Management and Social Investment Programme in partnership with Bauchi State Government.
“All the 7,538 food vendors should comply with the directives of the exercise as the exercise will provide us with the opportunity to enrol more pupils if approved by the Federal Government,” she said.
She said that Corps members were engaged in the exercise and called on the general public to cooperate with them for a hitch-free exercise.
The special adviser explained that the recent non-payment of funds to food vendors was in line with the scaling-up exercise.
Also speaking, Mr Walbe Setka, an official of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), Bauchi State office, said that a monitoring mechanism had been developed for the monitoring and supervision of the exercise in the state.
According to him, 312 Corps members are deployed to various communities, adding that they were trained in the four zones of the state for the exercise.
“A mechanism was devised to ensure that quality data is obtained and we have all written to their places of primary assignments for them to carry out the exercise,” he said.
He urged the Corp members to be patriotic in discharging their assignments.
Mr Gidado Abubakar, an official of the NHGSFP Abuja office, said that the exercise was aimed at enumerating the beneficiaries across the country for national planning on the NHGSFP.
Some of the food vendors, Mrs Maimuna Bello and Mrs Maryan Umar, expressed their appreciation for the investment of the Federal Government in the programme.
