Food Bank taken to Kavango West

NKURENKURU, 25 SEP – Namibia’s Food Bank Programme was launched in Nkurenkuru for the Kavango West Region on Monday.
Minister of Poverty Eradication and Social Welfare, Zephania Kameeta who officially launched the programme said he visited the region in July to discuss the possibility of bringing the programme here.
“I am happy that today we can commence with the distribution of food to the people who have been identified,” he said.
The minister said he is one of those people who does not like to talk without putting this into practical action, noting that a problem in the country is people talking more and doing less.
“It is good to talk and it is good to hear ideas. But it is also good that after the talks we put into action what we have been thinking and talking about. That is why we are here after talking,” said Kameeta.
A total of 138 people were registered by the earlier identified and trained members of the street committee.
Kameeta said he knows there may be more people who would like to benefit from the programme, however, the ministry’s focus is those people who are in extreme abject poverty.
“Those who do not know where to get their meal the following day,” he explained.
Kameeta said President Hage Geingob came up with the food bank idea because he had seen and read about people going hungry and looking for food at rubbish dumps.
“He refused to allow this in an independent country and on that basis, the programme was established. The programme spent a lot of time in the Khomas Region as the ministry was first learning, and a lot of mistakes were also made along the way but the ministry learned from those,” Kameeta added.
The beneficiaries each received a bag of maize meal, sunflower oil, tinned corned beef, wheat flour and soap.
(NAMPA)