Parliamentary Representative for Vieux Fort North, Moses Jn. Baptiste, was one of the main presenters at a United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization’s seminar on Sustainable School Feeding Programmes which took place in Grand Cayman on Tuesday, October 25.
Jn. Baptiste was invited to speak on his experience with a new model of school feeding, which involves a focus on healthy and safe food, school gardens and partnership with the local and private sectors.
According to Jn. Baptiste, the work on improving the School Feeding Programme which was pioneered in Saint Lucia from 2013 with partners in education, social transformation, health and agriculture, among other agencies and donor governments, has been recognized by regional and international agencies as an example of a model that can be strengthened and shared with other countries.
Jn. Baptiste focused his discussion on the importance of high-level political will, strong inter-ministerial and inter-sectoral coordination and deep community integration. Saint Lucia’s experience with school feeding as a means of connecting schools to agriculture was also highlighted.
Jn. Baptiste continues to thank his former ministerial colleagues for the role that they played in establishing Saint Lucia’s model of Improved School Feeding, the staff of all the ministries who were involved, the private sector and the parents who helped to build new facilities in schools.
According to Jn. Baptiste, food and nutrition security and all its aspects provide our countries an excellent opportunity to expand agriculture and at the same time develop business opportunities around local food production. He indicated that he will continue to advocate for changing practices and attitudes towards food security and school feeding in Saint Lucia and sister countries of Latin America and the Caribbean.