Prime Minister Dr Lotay Tshering said the government will soon increase the stipend of students in boarding schools to ensure students are fed nutritious diet. At the meet the press session held last week, he shared that government will now focus on qualitative feeding.
It is in line with Druk Nyamrup Tshogpa’s pledge of free nutritious lunch programs in all schools.
“We wanted to have school feeding programs in all the schools if possible. The agriculture and education ministries are working on it. We are going to increase the stipends of the students and the increased amount will not go to the ministry of education but to agriculture. The agriculture ministry will feed the students,” Prime Minister Dr Lotay Tshering said.
He said they have already held several meetings on this matter and it is now in the final stages of approval.
“WFP as they phased out, we have taken over. Everything was planned from a long time back with budgetary provisions. Now it’s time to graduate from subsistence farming to commercial farming and to graduate from quantitative feeding to qualitative feeding,” he added.
Implementing free nutritious lunch programs in all schools was one of the 25 pledges the government had promised to undertake within 120 days of taking over the office.