NOURISHING CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS IN INDIA: HOW IS INDIA’S MEGA SCHOOL MEAL PROGRAM COPING WITH COVID-19?
India has taken the lockdown approach to limit the spread of COVID-19. As a result, schools across the country were closed. The Mid-Day Meal Scheme, which is the largest among the school feeding programs could no longer provide the much-needed free lunch to the 6 to 14-year-old children. Particularly, in times of rising food insecurity, lack of access to such a meal has implications for children’s diets. In this blog, Samuel Scott and Purnima Menon from International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) together with Shariqua Yunus, and Bishow Parajuli from World Food Programme examine the state-level policy adaptations to ensure that children receive their entitlements. The authors further discuss potential impacts of these adaptations on nutrition and food security. Rasmi Avula, series co-editor and Research Fellow, Poverty, Health, and Nutrition Division (PHND)
Tamil Nadu: Children in school having their mid-day meals before the covid-19 pandemic. Shutterstock/CatherineLProd
The education-nutrition link
School closures due to COVID-19 have impacted over 90% of the world’s student population. India’s 321 million school-aged children have been out of school since the nation-wide lockdown came into effect on March 24.
For children, schools are more than a place to learn. They serve as a critical delivery point for several health, poverty-reduction, food, and gender interventions. With school closures, innovative solutions are necessary to reach out to school-aged children who rely on these services, now more than ever.
The largest school feeding program in the world benefits more than just students
Globally, nearly every country has some form of school feeding program, but India’s Mid-Day Meal (MDM) scheme is among the largest. MDM provides free lunch to approximately 100 million children, aged 6-14 years, across 1.3 million government primary and upper primary schools, for at least 200 days a year. The scheme also forms part of India’s National Food Security Act 2013 and is legally binding for the 28 States and 8 Union Territories (UT) to fund and implement.
The Mid-Day Meal scheme was launched with the objectives of improving nutrition intake of children in school, encouraging poor and disadvantaged children to attend school regularly, helping children learn better, and addressing short-term hunger. This includes key target groups such as children of migrant workers, who now face an unprecedented level of hardship. The scheme also employs 2.5 million cooks-cum-helpers and acts as a source of income for local farmers who sell produce to schools.
How has India’s Mid-Day Meal scheme responded to the pandemic?
In India, MDM is managed and implemented at the state and UT levels. Due to the high population of most states and large geographic variability in culture and diets, this decentralized approach is critical to timely decision-making and adaptation during crises.
In line with the lockdown announced on March 24, and the subsequent school closures, the central government issued orders to the states and UTs to continue providing the MDM entitlement to students during lockdown as well as during the summer vacation. Recognizing how important MDM is to India’s poorer children, these orders requested continued provision of the MDM via home delivery or cash transfers to families of eligible children during COVID-19. Many states revised their Mid-Day Meal strategies to ensure that children continue to receive their meals.
As of May 1, a total of 15 of the 36 states/UTs have taken different steps to adapt to the MDM scheme for children (Figure 1). The delivery mode of these meals varies – from parents collecting dry ration or cash at the school to home delivery (by cooks-cum-helpers, school staff, or other frontline workers), as well as direct bank transfers and distribution at fair price shops.
Figure 1. How states in India have adjusted their mid-day meal strategy in response to COVID-19. Note that this information is as of May 1, 2020. The data has been collected from media reports and through telephonic calls to government counterparts and development partners in states. Map created by Anjali Pant.
What types of impacts may be felt in the short- to medium-term?
Available research shows that the educational objectives (school enrolment and learning) of the MDM scheme have been met. The nutritional benefits, although less studied, show some growth gains for participating children whose families suffered from drought. Evidence indicates that well-implemented school feeding programs can be high-return investments for nutrition, health, education, gender, poverty reduction, and local agriculture.
Given the limited diversity of foods provided, the capacity of Mid-day meals to alleviate drastic reductions in diet diversity, expected during and after COVID-19, would be low. However, in a food crisis, if MDM adaptations can help protect basic food insecurity, that would be a valuable initial contribution. In theory, shifts to cash allowances could support the purchase of nutrient-rich foods, but other research in India suggests that the costs of nutritious foods are still out of reach for most Indians and cash allowances would need to be substantial.
Shifting the transfer of benefit to the household may also mean that family members share the ration, which is often the case with food supplement provided through India’s flagship Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) program. This is not unusual in food transfer programs, and some early research could help identify the extent to which household sharing is likely limiting the child’s individual consumption.
Mid-Day Meal Scheme: A cornerstone of India’s nutrition security, with room for improvement
The COVID-19 pandemic has raised several food and nutrition challenges, and at the same time, provides an opportunity to examine how MDM can contribute effectively to enhance nutrition security. The MDM has energy and protein mandates, requiring schools to provide 450 kcal and 12 g protein for younger students, and 700 kcal and 20 g protein for older students. The type of food given can vary by school and day, but predominantly consists of a large portion of a staple such as rice (mostly) or wheat, and a small portion of pulses. Sometimes a small portion of seasonally available vegetables is served, and in 10 states, a boiled egg is served on a weekly or daily basis. The scheme has also recently established school nutrition gardens to encourage consumption of freshly grown vegetables.
Thinking ahead: Policy and research adaptation
With physical distancing in India recommended for the foreseeable future, India’s education system will likely require transformation. States will also need to adapt to ensure that MDM benefits reach students, regardless of whether they attend school from home or from a physical school building, and irrespective of the stage of the disease or the measures imposed during the lockdown.
The Mid-day-meal scheme is one of several food-based safety nets that provide food and nutrition security for Indian children, especially those in critical development stages of early adolescence. India’s MDM program must be protected, adapted and if needed, expanded to help support India’s human development. As the COVID-19 pandemic unfolds, more research on coping with an adapted MDM can help strengthen the program and inform effective food policies for school children.
Samuel Scott is a Research Fellow, IFPRI’s Poverty Health and Nutrition Division (PHND). Purnima Menon is a Senior Research Fellow, IFPRI’s PHND. Shariqua Yunus is Nutrition Specialist at World Food Programme. Bishow Parajuli is Representative and Country Director at World Food Programme. The analysis and opinions expressed in this piece are solely those of the authors.
This blog has been published as a part of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), South Asia, blog series on analyzing the impacts of the COVID-19’s pandemic on the sub-national, national, and regional food and nutrition security, poverty, and development. To read the complete blog series click here
