School feeding caterers to be paid arrears
Caterers of the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) will from the first week of April this year, receive payment for 70 days outstanding arrears for the first term of the 2015/2016 academic year.
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According to the GSFP, funds had been released by the government to that effect.
The Public Relations Officer of GSFP, Alhaji Siiba Alfa, who announced this at a press conference in Accra on Tuesday said, since the scheme adopted the electronic mode of payment, there had been prompt disbursement of funds to caterers all over the country.
“The effective use of the MTN Mobile Money Service and the Ghana Interbank Payment Settlement System is making it possible for the 20,000 caterers under the GSFP to get their monies on time,” he stated.
Disbursement
Alhaji Alfa said the GSFP had already paid for 64 days out of the 69 days of the second term of 2014/2015 academic year.
According to him, other arrears would be cleared in the next five days, adding that 38 days out of the 55 days of the third term of 2014/2015 academic year had been paid.
Alhaji Alfa commended the caterers and other stakeholders for their support. He urged them to remain calm since the GSFP was putting in place a mechanism to ensure the speedy disbursement of monies.
Collaborations
Alhaji Alfa said the GSFP, in collaboration with the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA), would register beneficiary children on the school feeding programme onto the NHIA free of charge. They would also be provided with ID cards to distinguish them from others.
This intervention, he explained, would not only provide the beneficiary pupils with free health care, but would also validate yearly, the number of children on the school feeding programme in each school.
Alhaji Alfa said the GSFP had commenced a pilot registration of the project at Dodowa in the Greater Accra Region, and added that the exercise had exposed all the bottlenecks associated with the system.
