McGovern-Dole International Food for Education

Description

The McGovern-Dole International Food for Education program provides U.S. agricultural commodities and financial and technical assistance to food-insecure countries to establish school feeding programs. In addition to providing primary school and preschool meals for children in need, McGovern-Dole funds improve nutrition and maternal health in the critical first 1,000 days between a mother’s pregnancy and her child’s second birthday and boost literacy rates by incentivizing families to keep their children in school. The program also works to increase access to safe water and improved sanitation—contributing to improved community health—and works with local farmers to bolster sustainable production of nutritious foods.

Use of Funds

McGovern-Dole funds the transportation of donated U.S. agricultural products, financial and technical assistance, educational instruction, teacher training, school infrastructure construction, and water and sanitation improvements.

Justification

• McGovern-Dole programs bring girls into classrooms by using various strategies to incentivize families to send their girls to school, including supplying take-home rations to people whose girls have good attendance.
• In F.Y. 2020, McGovern-Dole projects:
  • Provided school meals to over 1.9 million food-insecure children in more than 13,000 schools.
  • Trained more than 8,400 parent-teacher associations on how to advocate for better education and school feeding.
  • Educated more than 8,900 teachers on how to improve literacy.
  • Rehabilitated or created over 3,700 facilities, including latrines, kitchens, handwashing stations, and classrooms to reduce student absenteeism.
  • Provided critical deworming medication to over 700,000 children.
• Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, programs have provided U.S. and locally-procured commodities to more than 1.7 million participants and their families and provided distance-learning materials and books.