Scaling up of School-Feeding in Mozambique through South-South and Triangular Cooperation

Reaching the most vulnerable and contributing to achieving Sustainable Development Goal 2

Since 1977, the World Food Programme (WFP) has been implementing and managing school feeding programmes in Mozambique in order to address food security and nutrition deficiencies for the most vulnerable children. Its programme in Mozambique has grown to reach over 190,000 children, and remains one of WFP’s longest standing programmes. For over a decade, WFP has supported the Government of Mozambique in leveraging South-South and triangular cooperation (SSTC) as a vehicle to facilitate the transition from a WFP-led school feeding programme to a nationally owned programme.  

As part of this effort, SSTC has been identified as key means to support this transition by enabling Mozambique to tap into the Brazilian experience in school feeding to promote policy change and potential institutional capacity strengthening. 

Driven by host government demand, WFP started to facilitate SSTC with the Brazilian Government in 2010. The Brazilian home-grown school feeding programme (PNAE) is one of the oldest and largest globally. It is internationally known as a good practice for integrating procurement of fresh food from local smallholders, context-specific school menus and nutrition education. Tapping into the experience and expertise of the Government of Brazil, WFP has been supporting the Government of Mozambique to establish and scale-up its national home-grown school feeding (PRONAE).  

Accordingly, this tripartite partnership between Mozambique, Brazil and WFP is contributing to the transition from the WFP-implemented school feeding programme to a national programme for a sustainable school feeding programme (PRONAE). The national programme was officially approved by the Council of Ministers in 2013. PRONAE’s multi-sector approach supports the provision of balanced and diversified food baskets in schools, deworming, food and nutrition education, school gardens and local food purchases. PRONAE was established with three concrete objectives: to improve the nutritional and health status of students; to provide food and nutrition education in schools; and to develop skills for agricultural and livestock production. To catalyse the bilateral knowledge exchanges, in 2011, the WFP Centre of Excellence (CoE) Against Hunger in Brazil was requested by both governments to provide technical assistance to Mozambique and to promote further venues for policy dialogue in specific PRONAE phases. 

Phase I of the SSTC pilot project (2013–2015) emphasized a multisector approach, community participation and institutional purchasing of locally produced food. The phase involved 12 schools and tested two implementing models, one school-centred and one district-centred. The Brazilian Government provided technical support, funding and policy advocacy support through policy dialogue, the deployment of experts and training workshops.  

In 2016, an evaluation of the SSTC project informed a second phase of PRONAE and a SSTC project that aimed at scaling up PRONAE, starting in 2018. The second phase included support to develop a cost-benefit analysis, which was subsequently completed. Also, the creation of a school feeding law, as well as capacity development activities, aimed at improving government’s operational capacity, accountability and monitoring at all levels have been initiated but delayed due to climate disasters and the pandemic crisis. WFP-facilitated SSTC continues to be a key mechanism to leverage these efforts with the Government of Brazil by providing technical assistance and policy support for the Government of Mozambique in order to strengthen PRONAE’s systems and frameworks. Between 2016 and 2020, Brazil brought its experience in food and nutrition education, local procurement and institutional coordination. 

An innovative arrangement between WFP, the Russian Federation and the Government of Mozambique provided US$ 40 million for school feeding in Mozambique from 2018 to 2021. The funds are dedicated to expanding PRONAE to a total of 150,000 students in all ten provinces in Mozambique. This includes investments in strengthening government capacities to sustainably implement homegrown school feeding throughout the country, in line with the other cooperation activities in place. 

Building on this collaboration, new SSTC opportunities are arising for local development and capacity strengthening of PRONAE in synergy with another initiative between Brazil and Mozambique. For example, the Beyond Cotton project aims to support cotton producers to commercialize cotton by-products such as oil and associated crops (e.g. corn, sorghum, and beans) also through institutional markets such as PRONAE. In 2019, the WFP CoE in Brazil supported the Government of Mozambique in a feasibility assessment that will guide the next steps of the implementation of the Beyond Cotton project. 

Through a long-standing SSTC partnership, good practices from Brazil to Mozambique contributed to the establishment of a national programme with support from WFP-facilitated SSTC. Leveraging SSTC and WFP’s experience in school feeding in Mozambique has led to the adoption of PRONAE as a state policy led by the Ministry of Education, ensuring the sustainability of the programme.