A huge smile and a healthy meal in Cambodia
Sok Lin’s face is filled with an enormous grin.
She loves attending school and like many Cambodian students, dreams of becoming a teacher when she grows up. At 13 years old, she’s motivated to study, and not just when she’s at school.
‘‘I always want to come to school because I will then learn new lessons from my teacher. This helps me with my homework,” she said.
At home, her life is very different. Her parents migrated to Thailand three years ago in search of employment and a better income, and they are yet to return. But they aren’t alone. In Sok Lin’s village, 80% of all adults here have migrated at least once. This is worse during the dry season when a regular income in their village is hard to come-by.
Sok Lin lives with her grandmother while her parents work in a factory across the border. They return once a year, during the Khmer New Year in April. This year, they could not afford to make the trip home. As the adults leave, the grandparents have become responsible for raising children, and many do this for years at a time.
Sok Lin is determined that her life will be different. “I love my grandmother and never want to migrate,’’ she said.
The power of a healthy meal
For the last seven years, Sok Lin has received a warm breakfast each day at school from the World Food Programme. These meals always make her smile, as they keep her stomach full and she can concentrate better in class after a healthy meal. She says that her favorite dish is fried wax gourd with eggs.
“School breakfast is an important incentive to encourage children to come to school regularly. As you can see, when meals are served all of them look happy,’’ explained Ouch Chat, School Principal of L’Vea Primary School.
The school day starts early in Cambodia, and students arrive a little before 6:30am to clean their classrooms. Then they collect their spoons, plates and breakfast, which was prepared by two school cooks. The cooks wake up in the dark each day so they can have the students’ meal ready before class begins.
While the meals taste great to students, there are benefits to the parents and grandparents too.
“When Sok Lin receives school meals, her parents can save some money for her to continue to the secondary school and further,’’ said Sok Choeun, Sok Lin’s 60-year old grandmother. Sok Lin’s parents care about her education and want her to succeed at school. One of the reasons they migrated to Thailand was to earn money to support her education, especially as she will start secondary school next year.
The school meals programme also supports local farmers, who supply the food that the students eat, including rice, vegetables, meat and fish. This food is fresh and the meals are based on the ingredients that are in season, which provides dietary diversity throughout the year.
For farmers, this is a chance to earn an income close to home while supporting children in their community to eat a healthy diet.
To ensure sustainability of the school meal programme in Cambodia, WFP works with the Government and other partners to strengthen the capacity of school cooks and smallholder famers to implement and manage the school meal programme. Farmers have been trained to improve their agricultural practices so they become more resilient to climate change and are better able to withstand weather extremes.
Story written by Ratanak Leng.
Read more about WFP’s work in Cambodia
