The Federal Government has announced plans to extend the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP) to cover both in-school and out-of-school children, with a projection to reach 50 million pupils by 2026.

The National Programme Manager of the National Social Investment Programme Agency (NSIPA), Aderemi Adebowale, disclosed this in Abuja in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria.

She explained that the expansion would include all primary classes as well as children who are currently out of school.

“We are working to include early years – primary 1 to 3, primary 4 to 6 – in the school feeding programme, and also out-of-school children, which we are handling step by step to integrate. So, by the year 2026, we are looking at feeding close to 50 million pupils in primary school in Nigeria,” Adebowale said.

On funding, she stated that the agency had developed a system to regulate food prices by engaging directly with farmers, suppliers, and aggregators.

“With this alignment, we’ll be able to control price from the rock bottom. We are not going to be doing market prices. So, we have to agree on prices from our suppliers, agri-vendors and farmers to arrive at a reasonable cost per plate. Once we do that, we will follow up on the payment and service delivery,” she said.

She added that the cost per child would be maintained between ₦500 and ₦1,000 daily, noting, “Even at ₦500 per child, you should be able to still give the children a nutritious and delicious meal on a daily basis.”

The announcement builds on the Alternate Education and Renewed Hope National Home-Grown School Feeding Project launched on May 27, 2025, by the Federal Government to target 20 million out-of-school and underserved children. The project was introduced in Abuja by the then Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction, Nentawe Yilwatda, who is now the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress.

The Renewed Hope National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme (RH-NHGSFP) was rolled out in partnership with the National Commission for Almajiri and Out-of-School Children Education and the National Identity Management Commission.

At the inauguration, Yilwatda had described the feeding initiative as one of the central components of the National Social Investment Programme Agency under President Bola Tinubu’s administration.