The Bangladesh government has chalked out a mammoth Tk 19,280 crore project proposal to provide daily school meals to all 1.41 crore government primary school students in a bid to increase attendance and reduce dropouts.

Primary and mass education ministry officials said they sent the Development Project Proposal (DPP) of Primary School Feeding Programme (PSFP) to the planning commission in early July for approval.

The project will be vital to containing the regular trend of dropouts as well as dropouts following the Covid-19 outbreak, they said.

Many government documents and international reports have warned that the ongoing closure of schools in the country due to the coronavirus pandemic is increasing the possibility that thousands of marginalised students across the country may have to drop out and fall into child labour.

"If the project approval is delayed, we may face some problems as the tenure of the ongoing school feeding programme will end in December this year," said a top official of primary and mass education ministry earlier this week.

"Many project approvals take place in quick time, but we have seen that in the past the approval process of many large projects takes a longer time," said the official, adding that in case of delays in approval they might fall behind and face extra dropouts caused by the coronavirus-induced closures.

https://www.thedailystar.net/country/news/massive-tk-19280cr-school-feeding-programme-awaits-approval-1948281