Govt. kicks off village-based dairy farms-supplied free milk to students drive

The Government this week kicked off its campaign in Nuwara Eliya to distribute milk free among school children countrywide to raise their nutrition levels.

Under the initiative 159,403 children in 523 schools in the district will be given liquid milk under the auspices of the Economic Development Ministry.

In keeping with the Mahinda Chinthana vision of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, its objective is to make Sri Lanka self-sufficient in liquid milk and make it available to school children through dairy farms in the respective areas.  It will also benefit local farmers and secure their economic future.

The campaign commenced with the participation of 1,406 students at the Good Shepherd’s Convent, Nuwara Eliya. Deputy Economic Development Minister Muththu Sivalingam was the Chief Guest at this event where in addition to milk an egg was given free to each student for meals.  

Participating in the event, Nuwara Eliya District Secretary P.P. Kumarasiri expressed the hope that this would greatly help to eliminate malnutrition in the district which has recorded the highest percentage of malnutrition among infants in the country. 

Sri Lanka has a total of 9,662 state-run schools where nearly 3.9 million children study.  Under this program each student will be given 150 millilitres of milk.  The program will be extended to cover all schools in the island with the assistance of the Education Ministry, according to Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa.  He also said that steps will be taken to educate students on the health value of consuming liquid milk and provide schools with facilities for dairy and poultry farming.

District Secretary Kumarasiri said that 120,000 litres of milk per day are being produced in Nuwara Eliya and that the recent problem involving 30,000 litres of milk has now been completely solved since milk produced in each village will be sold among the people there under the new program. He also said that all state institutions including the Economic Development Ministry and the Central Provincial Council as well as members of Divi Naguma families and graduates, recently appointed development assistants, were giving invaluable assistance in coordinating this program.

According to Minister Rajapaksa the Ministry is encouraging people in divisional areas of every district to produce via the Divi Naguma National Program food stuffs such as vegetables, milk and eggs and manufacture items each area needs. He said that the ministry has launched special programs to market the excess products.