For Mid Day Meal: Now, kids to also have self-grown veggies in MDM
In a bid to develop nurturing skills from an early age and make kids understand the sheer labour that goes into growing food in farms, the Mid Day Meal (MDM) Authority, UP, has instructed district magistrates and education department officials of the state to encourage children of government-run primary and upper primary schools to start ‘kitchen gardens’ in free spaces within their school premises.
In a bid to develop nurturing skills from an early age and make kids understand the sheer labour that goes into growing food in farms, the Mid Day Meal (MDM) Authority, UP, has instructed district magistrates and education department officials of the state to encourage children of government-run primary and upper primary schools to start ‘kitchen gardens’ in free spaces within their school premises.
A pan-UP project, the initiative is being implemented following instructions to promote this exercise in the meeting of the project approval board of Union Ministry of Human Resource development (MHRD) held on June 14, said assistant director (basic education), Allahabad division, Ramesh Kumar Tiwari.
He said a missive in this regard had been sent by the director, UP MDM Authority, Abdul Samad to all district magistrates with copies marked to basic education department officials, including director of basic education, UP, as well as divisional level assistant directors (basic education).
“The letter says that kids in government run primary and upper primary schools are served green vegetables as part of MDM. During inspections, it has been observed that a large number of these schools have extra land on their premises. The students under supervision of their teachers would now be encouraged to nurture a kitchen garden there. The vegetables grown by them are to be used in MDM meals being cooked for them,” added Tiwari explaining the initiative spelled out in the July 13 missive.
Uttar Pradesh has around 50,000 upper primary and over a lakh primary government-run schools.
The kids would also be encouraged to plant flower bearing plants as part of this initiative, Tiwari said.
Welcoming the move, Shobhi Verma, a teacher at the government primary school in South Malaka, said the initiative would help kids understand the efforts that farmers put in to grow different crops and also make them understand the importance of weather, nurturing and environment.
In agreement was Vatsala Mishra, headmistress, government primary school, Mungari village in Karchana development block of Allahabad, also known as Mungari-II. “I think this is a great move as kitchen gardens would not just allow kids to learn useful skills of gardening but also imbibe sense of responsibility and care among them,” she added.
