A. Background
The Private Service Provider (PSP) knowledge, attitudes, and practices (KAPs) assessment was done to see how well PSPs who were trained by the CASCADE project and worked with the National Home-Grown School Feeding Program (NHGSFP) remembered and used what they learnt about basic nutrition, food safety, hygiene, and handling raw materials.
The NHGSFP aims to provide daily nutritious meals to public primary school pupils using locally grown farm produce, thereby enhancing children's health, increasing school attendance, and supporting local farmers while contributing to the overall economic and social development of Nigeria. The program was suspended in January 2024 for nine weeks; however, since the suspension by the president, the program has yet to kick off, even with budgetary allocations in the 2024 and 2025 budgets. This suspension has hindered the effective application of the knowledge and skills gained during the training.
CASCADE is transitioning to integrate secondary school cooks currently participating in state-funded school feeding programs through the State Ministry of Education as opposed to the NHGSFP/Social Protection ministry. This process involves identifying secondary schools serving meals, consulting school principals who oversee the cooks, managing funds, procuring food items, and conducting targeted training at the LGA level to ensure adherence to nutrition and food safety standards. To find out if the trained PSPs continue to use their nutrition knowledge and food safety skills after they stop working for the program, the assessment was done during this time of change.
The findings offer valuable insights into behaviour change, sustainability, nutrition, and food safety gaps, as well as regional disparities in knowledge retention. More importantly, they provide an evidence base for future food vendor training, particularly as the project shifts toward strengthening basic nutrition and food safety practices among secondary school cooks.
By assessing how trained PSPs retained and applied their learnings post-training, this study informs adaptive programming strategies and highlights advocacy opportunities for sustained investment in food vendor capacity-building. The findings reinforce the need for structured and continuous training programs to maintain high food safety standards, ensuring that food vendors across all levels are well-equipped to deliver safe, healthy, and nutritious meals.
B. Key Insights from the Assessment
1. Sustained Behaviour Change: Even after the suspension of NHGSFP, many PSPs continued practicing improved food safety and nutrition in their homes and communities, demonstrating the program’s lasting impact.
2. Gaps in Food Safety Knowledge: While general food safety awareness improved, some PSPs exhibited knowledge gaps in food handling, fortified ingredient use, and hygiene compliance, highlighting the need for refresher training.
3. Regional Variations in Adoption: Disparities were observed in food safety and hygiene practices, with PSPs in Kebbi and Nasarawa showing lower adherence to recommended protocols compared to those in Bauchi and Jigawa.
4. Advocacy for Continuous Training: Findings reinforce the need for structured and ongoing capacity-building efforts, especially as the program transitions to working with secondary school food vendors.
C. Implication for Future Food Vendor Training
1. Incorporate Lessons into Secondary School Training Programs: The insights from PSPs should inform the design of training modules for new food vendors to ensure stronger compliance with food safety protocols.
2.Strengthen Peer-to-Peer Learning and Community Engagement: PSPs who demonstrated consistent food safety practices can serve as peer educators to sustain learning among new vendors.
3. Advocate for Continuous Food Safety Support Mechanisms: The assessment highlights the importance of policy-driven refresher training, food vendor certification, and continuous supervision to prevent lapses in hygiene and nutrition practices.
4. Tailor Interventions to Address Knowledge Gaps: Given the regional disparities, targeted training programs should focus on areas where adoption rates were lower, ensuring equitable knowledge transfer.
D. Conclusion.
With the NHGSFP program suspended, this assessment provides a critical evidence base for shaping future food safety and nutrition training for secondary school vendors. The sustained improvements among PSPs highlight the importance of continuous learning, structured refresher training, and systemic support to ensure that food vendors remain equipped with the skills needed to provide safe, nutritious meals. Addressing these gaps through targeted training, peer learning, and policy-driven support mechanisms will be crucial in ensuring sustained improvements in food safety and nutrition.
