WFP in Holguin presents program’s impact on school nutrition

The World Food Program (WFP) presented the impact of its Sustainable School Feeding (AES+) project on the nutritional health of children with participants of the National Workshop on Primary Education, in the municipality of Mayari, in Holguin.

At the meeting, held Wednesday at the Leonte Guerra Castellanos boarding school, which benefits from the program, education directors from all over Cuba exchanged with students and promoted healthy and varied food through artistic presentations and exhibitions of circles of interest.

Zoe Díaz, WFP official, explained that the AES+, developed with funds from the Russian Federation and support from the Health, Agriculture and Commerce sectors, is being implemented in the eastern provinces to strengthen local food production with a resilient approach to improve the situation of vulnerable population groups.

To achieve this, links were established between social protection networks, such as semi-boarding schools and the Family Care System, together with the Niceto Pérez Credit and Services Cooperative (CCS), which was given tools for agricultural production and will continue to benefit from material resources, including cultivation houses, motor cultivators, electric tricycles and others, she said.

Zulima Lobaina Olazábal, national director of Primary Education and project leader, commented that the region was selected to respond to its demographic policy, since it has fewer semi-boarding schools than the rest of the country.

In Holguín, six schools of this type were chosen, three in the municipality of Cueto and the remaining in Mayarí, which favors about a thousand students who study in them, from the nutritional and learning point of view, she said.

Olga Lidia Proenza Gómez, director of Leonte Guerra school, added that the plan was introduced in her center during 2023, when, following a request to the CCS Niceto Pérez, she began to provide them, at an affordable price, with the necessary products in time, quantity and diversity to offer a balanced diet to the nearly 300 children enrolled.

The educators and students were motivated to organize 16 groups of interest in subjects such as the preparation of dishes, gastronomic services and agricultural production, while preparing them for their future work, he said.

The AES+ project implemented by the WFP is committed to strengthening alliances in the northeastern territory to achieve sustainable local autonomy, more resilient to natural disasters and climate change.

With information from Agencia Cubana de Noticias / Translated by Radio Angulo