Finance Minister, Ken Ofopri-Atta, has claimed that the Government spent Ghc54.3million, to provide food for the beneficiaries who received meals from government during the two-week long partial lockdown of Greater Accra and Ashanti Regions.
Additionally, the government also transferred Ghc50.2million to 400,000 beneficiaries under the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) program, to help mitigate the impact of the pandemic within the two week period.
Presenting the 2020 mid-year supplementary budget in Parliament today, he said that government through the Gender Ministry and NADMO provided 1,827,581 and 917,142 cooked food packs to vulnerable persons within Accra and Kumasi.
Mr. Ofori-Atta did not break down the accounting, but per the figures that he mentioned, it means each of the 400,000 beneficiaries under LEAP got Ghc125.5.
For those who were provided food, the calculation indicates that on average each pack cost almost Ghc20.
“In collaboration with Faith-Based Organizations (FBO’s), Government also distributed dry food packages to about 470,000 families. Let me extend my deepest gratitude to the Faith-based organisations for this unique partnership with Government and may the Lord count this as righteousness for the FBOs and Government.
“Mr Speaker, the support to households, in terms of supply of dry food packs and hot cooked meals cost Government GH¢54.3 million to enable them mitigate the impact of the pandemic. This was in addition to an amount of GH¢50.2 million transferred to the 400,000 most-vulnerable individuals under the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) Programme” Mr. Ofori-Atta said.
According to him Government has also launched “Operation Return Home” to evacuate Ghanaian nationals stranded abroad.
As at end-June 2020, a total of 2,250 individuals had been evacuated with Government bearing the full cost of flight and mandatory 14-day hotel quarantine services for 1,116 persons, most of whom are students.