78,000 pupils in Migori to get free milk

About 78,000 pre-school and lower primary school learners in Migori County will this week start receiving free milk.

The New Kenya Co-operative Creameries won the tender to supply the milk for the school feeding programme that was launched a few months ago by Governor Zachary Okoth Obado.

"Already we are in the process of stocking our Kericho store with milk. And from Thursday we shall be distributing milk to schools. This is a continuous process and all the pupils targeted will get the milk," said Mr Obado.

He said the programme is aimed at improving nutritional status of learners and to boost their performance.

The programme is estimated to cost more than Sh112 million per year and a trust fund has been established for its sustainability.

New KCC Regional Sales Manager Jeremia Kamencu said head teachers of public primary schools will be trained before Thursday on how to handle the programme.

"We have already started working on other modalities and logistics and by the time we shall start distributing milk, everything will be set," he said.

Migori has been recording poor retention rates in elementary schools due to poor learning environment, failure by parents to pay school levies, lack of feeding programmes and inadequate instructional materials.

County Director in charge of Education Lazarus Ogutu said the milk programme will help boost retention rate and improve pupils' performance.

Currently, the county government is constructing more than 100 pre-school classrooms in the region to accommodate increasing enrolment rate.

Recently, the county government recruited and deployed 378 pre-school teachers in all the 40 wards.