The Federal Government says it has so far disbursed ₦3.7bn to nine states under for one of its Social Investment Programme, the HomeGrown School Feeding Programme.
According to the Federal Government, the amount is meant for the feeding of 1,287,270 school children.
A statement by the Senior Special Assistant to the Acting President on Media and Publicity, Mr Laolu Akande, disclosed this on Sunday.
It listed the states that received the funds as Anambra, Enugu, Oyo, Osun, Ogun, Ebonyi, Zamfara, Delta and Abia, adding that 14,574 cooks had been hired as part of the programme.
A breakdown of the amount showed that Anambra state got a total of N693,013,300, in eight tranches with 103,742 children fed so far.
The total release for Enugu state is N419,427,200 in six tranches and 108,898 school children have so far been fed.
For Oyo state, a total of N414, 708, 700 have been released for the feeding of 107,983 children in six tranches.
Osun State got N767,483,244 in eight tranches for the feeding of 151,438 pupils, while Ogun state received N880,055,400 in seven tranches and fed 231,660 school children.
Ebonyi State received N344,633,100 in three tranches for the feeding of 163,137 school children, while Zamfara, Delta and Abia states got a total of N188,001,100, N63,366,100, N42,921,200, respectively for the feeding of 268,573, 90,523 and 61,316 pupils in that order.
According to the statement, Zamfara, Delta and Abia are the latest states to join the School Feeding Programme, which is projected to feed over Three million pupils this year.
It added, “The money is paid directly from the FG’s coffers to the cooks, with a slight variation in Osun State where some of the food items like eggs are bought centrally by an aggregator.”