Nutrition is not optional. it is FOUNDATIONAL! But right now, early nutrition is grossly under-supported at ECD centres.

The Department of Basic Education funds ECD centres R6.80 per child-per day (approx. R9.60 after subsidy increases). Is a nutritious meal possible from this? Can two meals and a snack come from this?? Worst of all, not all centres are even receiving this funding.

Only 41% of centres are registered (eligible for funding). Of those, only 33% actually receive a subsidy. This means most ECD centres get no nutrition support at all. These centres are the one’s giving services to children from the poorest communities. What do we think these children are eating daily?? Often, nothing!!

Meanwhile, the same DBE runs a National School Nutrition Programme that feeds 9 million learners every day in primary and high schools. If school learners can’t concentrate hungry, how can young children, whose brains are developing way faster, play, learn, or grow on empty stomachs? Guys, c’mon!! The DBE gets it at school level. What’s not clocking???

1 in 4 children in South Africa are stunted, right now. Stunting damages physical growth, brain development, and long-term potential. This is a health crisis, AND a justice and equality issue.

This Nutrition Week (9 – 16 Oct), Real Reform for ECD is reactivating the hashtag#RightToNutrition Campaign, calling on the DBE to create a nutrition programme for ECD centres to give adequate nutrition to eligible children.

Since the original launch of our hashtag#RightToNutrition campaign in 2023, The DBE received R197 million (2024/25) and R336 million (2025/26) for a nutrition pilot. Guess what? Still no plan exists to create a nutrition programme. Nothing. Nada. Zip! Niks!! Children are hungry right now, while bureaucracy delays their right to eat. The money is there. Its all been bureaucratic delays!

This is a matter of urgency.
Every meal delayed is a child’s potential denied. Every meal delayed is a child’s potential denied. Every meal delayed is a child’s potential denied.

In the video attached, I’m with ECD practitioners from the Young Children Forum in Rustenburg. We spent the day together discussing and reflecting on early nutrition at their centres. We had storytelling sessions where practitioners told stories of what they go through to feed young children. More heartbreaking were story of what happens when they cannot feed the young children.

Ms. Siviwe Gwarube, the young children need you to act, NOW!

hashtag#FeedTheFutureNow hashtag#ChildrenCantLearnHungry hashtag#ECDReform hashtag#GrowOurNation The Do More Foundation Grow Great Campaign Union Against Hunger Early Care Foundation Ilifa Labantwana DataDrive2030