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COTABATO CITY — In a first-of-its-kind initiative, officials from the Davao City Local Government Unit (LGU) and the Department of Education (DepEd) visited the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) on December 10, 2025, to learn from the region’s pioneering Home-Grown School Feeding (HGSF) program — an initiative aimed at reducing child malnutrition while strengthening local agriculture.
During the learning visit, the Davao officials examined how BARMM’s Bangsamoro Food Security Task Force (BFSTF) is steering the region’s Food Security and Nutrition Roadmap (FSNR), ensuring that school feeding programs directly support local farmers with the Ministry of Basic, Higher and Technical Education (MBHTE) under Education Minister Mohagher M. Iqbal leading the program’s rollout in close coordination with some Bangsamoro agencies, such as Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Agrarian Reform (MAFAR), Ministry of Health (MOH), Bureau of Planning and Development Authority (BPDA), LGUs, and the World Food Programme (WFP).
The team observed farm-to-school partnerships and kitchen operations in Upi, Maguindanao del Sur, visited meal preparation sites at Blala Elementary School (BES), and held policy discussions with key BARMM leaders, including Minister Iqbal. Their visit was prompted by a social media post from WFP Ambassador KC Concepcion, which highlighted the region’s successful model.
BARMM institutionalized its SBFP in 2020, and it now serves about 160,000 learners annually — roughly 25% of the region’s student population across 11 schools divisions. Since 2024, the HGSF convergence pilot has been implemented, providing daily hot meals to over 10,589 students in 28 schools, supported by:
•a ₱22-million MBHTE budget for viands and operational needs
• WFP provision of iron-fortified rice, kitchen utensils, and technical assistance
• LGU support for kitchen upgrades and cook salaries
• MAFAR supply of school garden tools and seeds
• MOH distribution of deworming tablets
• Farmer cooperatives supplying fresh local produce
Inspired by BARMM’s success, Davao City plans to roll out its own HGSF program by June 2026 in the 3rd District, fully funded by the LGU and DepEd — a strong signal of its commitment to improving child nutrition, education outcomes, and local livelihoods.
“BARMM has shown what’s possible when everyone works together,” said Councilor Antoinette Principe.
The initiative marks growing national momentum toward sustainable, locally sourced school feeding programs — with BARMM emerging as a leading model for regions across the Philippines.
The Bangsamoro region, established in 2018 by the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL) to implement the 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB), is made up of the provinces of Basilan, Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, and Tawi-Tawi, the cities of Cotabato, Lamitan, and Marawi, as well as the Special Geographic Area’s (SGA) 63 barangays or villages — now eight new municipalities — that voted “Yes” in a plebiscite in February 2019 to be under the BARMM jurisdiction.
According to the Philippine Atlas BARMM has 4,404,288 people. It has 116 municipalities: Basilan, 11 municipalities; Lanao del Sur, 39; undivided Maguindanao, 36; Sulu, 19; and Tawi-Tawi, 11. Its component cities are Cotabato (the regional center and capital) in Maguindanao; Lamitan in Basilan; and Marawi in Lanao del Sur. (✓)