School Enrollment Increases 17% at Kenyan Schools After Launch of Meal Program

on November 4, 2024

This is the story of how a school feeding program is supporting children’s education and community-led transformation in Kenya.

Rise Against Hunger partners with Rural Family Hope to holistically reduce malnutrition and support education, agriculture, livelihoods and health through the Feed for Knowledge project in southwestern Kenya.

This region faces many food security challenges. One-third of Kenyans live below the poverty line, and 55% of those are children. Malnutrition rates are higher than the national average, and school feeding rates are the lowest in the country.

The Feed for Knowledge project sources local ingredients for daily meals in seven schools, training farmers on sustainable agriculture, establishing school gardens, providing schools with water tanks and more.

The project launched in 2022 and has already achieved amazing results — including a 17% increase in enrollment at the schools and improved academic performance of the students, including 13-year-old Befil.

Befil, a grade 8 student at Awendo Primary School

As a student at one of the schools served by the project, Befil — and all of her classmates — receives two nutritious meals daily. The meals consist of ingredients purchased locally with funds provided by Rise Against Hunger, crops from school gardens and produce from local farmers.

This school feeding program not only improves her nutritional status but also supports her education. As a driven student, this is very important to Befil. She said, “I like to come to school because education is the key to success.” She loves science and dreams for a bright future as a doctor or engineer.

Robert Karani, Head Teacher at Simbauti Primary School

As head teacher at Simbauti Primary School, Robert has seen the school feeding program’s impact on his students firsthand. The school is growing as the meals act as an incentive for more children in the community to attend. He said, “I came here in 2022. At the time I came in, we had a population of 257 learners. To date, as I’m talking, we have 445 learners in the institution, and each and every day, learners are coming in for admission.”

Ivone Ogweno, Agronomist at Rural Family Hope

Ivone grew up in the community and is an alumni of Awendo Primary School. Before the introduction of the feeding program, students would have to walk home — sometimes walking several kilometers — for lunch. This contributed to a lot of absenteeism and hindered students’ ability to focus on their studies. She said, “This is an opportunity that we never had when we were going to school, we used to go back to have lunch at home and sometimes the parents could not afford to give us three meals a day.”

There is now less absenteeism and dropout rates are almost zero. “The complaint of, ‘I didn’t get good grades because of food’ – I think that is sorted,” she said. Students eat at school and can focus better in class, leading to improved academic performance.

Befil, Robert and Ivone are just three of many leading and receiving support through the project. Watch the video below to also hear firsthand from Harry, Lorna and Graham and learn more about how this feeding program boosts education in Kenya.

Education is the key to breaking the cycle of poverty — and the schools participating in the Feed for Knowledge project are ensuring their students are nourished and educated, providing the children with the building blocks needed to reach their dreams.

It starts with a meal, and it starts with you. Your support helps make this impact in Kenya and around the world possible. Will you join us in the work to end global hunger by donating today?

Strength, Stability And Hope

The gift that filled Nelly’s table.

“We were yielding very little, and the crops could not sustain us the whole year,” Nelly remembers. As a mother of seven and a farmer with two decades of experience, the stress of inconsistent yields was all-consuming. A poor harvest not only strained her family financially, but also limited their own meals to just two a day. Their story reflects that of many in their fishing and farming village near a lake in the Karonga district of northern Malawi. Here, heavy rainfall makes conventional farming methods nearly impossible. The entire village is, quite literally, saturated in food insecurity — a reality that leaves families struggling to survive season after season without a dependable source of nourishment.

In 2019, Nelly began participating in Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience, a sustainable agriculture project implemented by Rise Against Hunger in partnership with the Foundation for Community Support Services (FOCUS). The project works with 3,100 smallholder farmers in Malawi’s Karonga and Mzimba districts to strengthen food and nutrition security by improving production methods, nutrition practices and household income.

Just one year later, Nelly was ready to expand the variety of crops on her farm. What land once only produced maize began to flourish with sesame, cowpeas, rice and groundnuts during the rainy season (summer), as well as maize and vegetables during the dry season (winter). Through climate-smart agriculture training, she learned new techniques like manure making, pit planting and mulching, crop rotation and intercropping. Equipped with these tools, Nelly’s farm began to thrive.

After the 2023–2024 growing season, she sold enough produce to purchase an ox cart. Her harvests in 2024-2025 season yielded over 500 pounds of crops, including 22 bags of groundnuts, seven bags of maize, 12 tins of sesame and three bags of rice. With this surplus, she was able to invest in a motorbike, which she now uses to transport African doughnuts (mandasi) that she cooks and sells — creating yet another source of income for her family.

The transformation reaches far beyond her finances. Nelly now has the stability to provide for her husband and children. “I am able to eat different food types, pay school fees for my children and fulfill the visions that I have made with my family,” she beams. “I am now sleeping peacefully without any fears of food or paying school fees for the children.”

Her leadership has also grown. Today, Nelly serves as a leader in the Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience project, teaching other farmers in her district to adopt climate-resilient, labor-saving practices. By sharing her knowledge, she is multiplying her impact — empowering her neighbors to experience the same transformation she has achieved.

Across Nelly’s community, food and economic security are on the rise. Lombani, a government extension officer for the region, explains, “I can see the community is being transformed in the sense that in the area, there is food, income and nutrition security. Development is also happening at the household level.”

Nelly reflects on what it means to invest in holistic programs that address the root causes of hunger: “We are now healthy people. Children are going to school after eating their breakfast, having high yields and different types of crops due to conservation agriculture practices. With the support from the project, we have food, and we can access other food items from the market after selling our produce.”

This is the gift that fills: a future full of stability, strength and hope. It fills tables with food, families with security and communities with the resources to thrive. It’s an investment in futures rooted in resilience and hope.