The National Coordinator of the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP), Hajia Fati Forgor, has accused some schools of inflating their enrolment figures to secure larger allocations under the programme, a practice she says is depriving genuinely needy schools of meals.
Hajia Forgor said the manipulation of enrolment data was allowing some schools to receive allocations far beyond their actual pupil population while other deprived schools in the same communities remained outside the programme.
She made the disclosure at a recent engagement with Ghana Education Service (GES) Regional and District Directors, where she called for urgent collaboration between the GSFP and GES to clean up school enrolment data.
“Most of the enrolment has been inflated. Some have been inflated beyond reasonable doubt,” Hajia Forgor said.
She explained that enrolment figures are a critical component of the payment system because government payments to caterers are based on the number of pupils officially recorded as beneficiaries.
Caterers, she said, pre-finance the preparation of meals and are subsequently paid by government based on the approved enrolment figures.
The Coordinator said the consequences of manipulating the figures went beyond individual schools, as inflated numbers could consume resources that could have been used to feed pupils in several other schools.
“We have these schools which are not benefiting from the programme. They are deprived schools. Where they are, they deserve it more. We are not having it,” she said.
According to her, District Chief Executives, Members of Parliament and other stakeholders have repeatedly drawn her attention to schools that are not benefiting from the programme despite the needs of children in those communities.
She further alleged that in some instances, individuals had worked with teachers to inflate enrolment figures to levels that could have absorbed several other schools within the same community.
“In those same jurisdictions, you have individuals who have combined with their teachers to inflate enrolment that could have absorbed about five schools within that same community,” she said.
Hajia Forgor said cleaning the data could therefore release resources for schools currently excluded from the programme and help move the country closer to universal school feeding.
She estimated that about 30 per cent of eligible schools are currently not benefiting from the programme.
Growing programme, growing data challenge
The concerns come at a time when the School Feeding Programme has expanded significantly.
The Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Dr Agnes Naa Momo Lartey, disclosed in September 2026 that the programme was providing daily meals to 4,527,636 children, up from 4.03 million in 2024.
Government’s allocation also increased from GH¢1.393 billion in 2024 to GH¢1.982 billion in 2026, while the feeding grant was raised from GH¢1.50 to GH¢2 per child per school day in 2025.
With more than four million children now covered, the accuracy of the enrolment figures used to determine allocations has become increasingly important.
The GSFP has also introduced a digital monitoring system known as School Connect, aimed at improving real-time monitoring, transparency and accountability, including the verification of school and feeding data. The pilot covers more than 350 schools.
The latest concerns are not entirely new.
A performance audit by the Auditor-General covering the GSFP between 2017 and 2022 identified enrolment manipulation among challenges affecting the programme. The audit cited an earlier case in the Sekyere East District where over GH¢141,000 was reportedly lost through padding of enrolment figures and other data manipulation.
The Auditor-General’s findings also documented instances where schools were allegedly duplicated in payment records or caterers were paid for numbers of pupils substantially higher than the actual enrolment.
Hajia Forgor is therefore calling for stronger cooperation between the GSFP and GES to verify school populations, eliminate inflated figures and ensure that allocations reflect the actual number of children being fed.
She said a credible and regularly updated database would help prevent distortions in the distribution of meals and create room for schools currently left out to benefit.
The objective, she stressed, is to ensure that resources meant to feed Ghanaian schoolchildren reach the children for whom the programme was designed.
Source: www.kumasimail.com
