Panel: School Feeding as a Tool to Fight Hunger (When Schools are Closed)
The Speakers:
- Moderated by Boitshepo “Bibi” Giyose, Senior Food and Nutrition Security Adviser, New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD)
- Carmen Burbano, Director of School Based Programmes, World Food Programme
- Rafael Fabrega, Director – Food for Development, Tetra Laval
- Cindy Long, Deputy Administrator, Child Nutrition Programs, U.S. Department of Agriculture
- Karine Santos, General Coordinator for the National School Feeding Programme, Brazilian National Fund for Education Development
The Highlights:
- The World Food Programme is closely monitoring school meal programs during COVID-19 school closures. At the peak of the pandemic, in April 2020 over 369 million children missed out on meals at school globally, 47% of which were girls. While these numbers have gone down since the peak of the pandemic, there’s still concern about how slowly these numbers are dropping.
Carmen Burbano: “It is very clear, to us as the World Food Programme, and through the international community, that we are looking at a catastrophic situation for education and for children that we have really never seen before in our lifetime… We are looking at a potential entire generation of children that will really never recover from this crisis. Some of them will never come back to school, including girls, children with disabilities, children living in fragile situations.”
Private sector partners, like Tetra Laval, are collaborating closely with country governments and other key stakeholders to implement alternative and safe food distribution solutions. COVID-19 has highlighted the resiliency of the food value chain despite many disruptions, the need for more investment in health, education, and agriculture, and the existing infrastructure challenges in school feeding programs.
- The United States Department of Agriculture pivoted quickly to address child hunger during school closures, in large part thanks to the federal legislative body’s responsiveness and increased funding to meet their needs. Due to the nature of the federal program, close collaboration between the state and federal agencies was key to ensuring a rapid response to the challenges of remote school feeding.
- Panelists recommend the following steps as we continue to navigate school closures:
- Continue to support children with meals while schools are closed.
- Support countries to reopen schools safely and restore access to meals.
- Evaluate added needs and whether school feeding can be used/adapted to reach the ones that will not come back to school without added incentives, especially girls.
- Protect education sector budgets (including school feeding)
About The Speakers

Boitshepo "Bibi" Giyose
Senior Food and Nutrition Security Adviser
New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD)

Carmen Burbano
Director of School Based Programmes
World Food Programme

Rafael Fábrega
Director, Food for Development
Tetra Laval
Rafael Fábrega is the Tetra Laval Food for Development Director, based in Stockholm, Sweden. In his role, he is responsible for leading the global Food for Development team in providing value-added support and technical assistance to Tetra Pak’s customers in collaboration with Governments, NGOs, UN and International Development Agencies with the objective of implementing sustainable school feeding and nutrition programmes linked to local agricultural development.
Rafael has a Master’s Degree in International Business Administration from the Wayne Huzienga Business School at Nova Southeastern University and a BBA Degree from Loyola University New Orleans. He has more than 20 years of experience in international business development with a specialization in creating public-private partnerships to address food security and nutrition challenges.
The company has a long history and tradition of active participation in the development of school feeding programmes and sharing their experiences and best practices used around the world. Today, more than 68 million children in 56 countries receive milk and other nutritious beverages in Tetra Pak packages at school.

Cindy Long
Deputy Administrator, Child Nutrition Programs
U.S. Department of Agriculture
