Akshaya Patra Observes World Hunger Day

Hunger is a complex word for children who are starving.  Majority of the children studying in Government schools go without food during lunch hours. For them, satisfying hunger is the major concern than learning. They are ready to go for work with their parents which will fetch them a meagre income.

World Hunger Day is observed every year on 28^th May. The event celebrates sustainable solutions to end extreme hunger and poverty. Studies show that there are millions of children in India who need to earn their own meal at a tender age. Due to this problem, children are unable to attend school. In such a situation mid-day meal served by Akshaya Patra acts a breather for the children.

The Mid-Day Meal Scheme is a Government initiative and under its aegis Akshaya Patra implements the scheme. Understanding that hunger is a hindrance for education and health, the NGO feeds the children with meals rich in nutrients, proteins, carbohydrates and vitamins which are essential for tackling issues of hunger and malnutrition.

Join Akshaya Patra in feeding the hungry children as India is home to the largest number of malnourished children. The National Family Health Survey (NFHS) estimates that 48 per cent, or 61 million, under-five children in the country are stunted (they have low height for their age); 43 per cent, or 53 million, are underweight; and nearly 20 per cent, or 25 million, are wasted (low weight for height). Let us stop hunger from claiming the childhood of millions of children. Malnutrition disrupts a child’s mental and physical development – which leads to poor concentration as well as poor critical thinking and creativity.

Hunger is preventable if all of us join hands in supporting Akshaya Patra. If the problem of hunger is solved, children can pursue education as it is the best way to escape poverty. The motive of Akshaya Patra is to stop childhood hunger and thereby support education.

The organisation serves nutritious meals in 24 locations across 10 states of India. In a day, meals are served to 1.5 million children. The Akshaya Patra Foundation is the world's largest not-for-profit organisation providing wholesome mid-day meals. For feeding a child for an entire academic year, it will cost only ₹750.

Support us @ www.akshayapatra.org/world-hunger-day

Read our World Hunger Day blog @ http://blog.akshayapatra.org/our-hope-this-world-hunger-day/

Akshaya Patra Observes National Technology Day

Every year National Technology Day is observed on May 11^th to bring awareness about the significance of science and technology in daily life as well as motivate students in learning science. The day also commemorates the history of India's technological capability.

Technology includes the tools, machines, instruments, transporting devices and the skills by which we use them in our day to day life.  Use of technology helps in optimizing quality, minimising cost, efficient use of space, time and labour. In kitchens, technology has spread its efficient hands making work easier and utilizing smart engineering techniques to maintain quality as well as reducing costs. So technology driven ventures are the part and parcel of Akshaya Patra kitchen, which serves 1.5 million children in 11360 schools across 10 states in India in 24 locations.

There are centralised and decentralised kitchen catering to particular localities. All the centralised kitchens are fully automated and equipped with cauldrons, trolleys, rice chutes, dal/sambar tanks, cutting boards, knives and other equipment’s. Cooking takes place in mechanized, steam heated cauldrons custom built to save time. Steam is used as a source of cooking, which accelerates the cooking process, retains nutrients as well as cost-effective and clean. Large stainless steel cauldrons with easy-tilt mechanisms prepare 1,200 litres of lentils in two hours and a specially designed roti-making machine cooks up 40,000 rotis in one hour. These fully automated kitchens can prepare 185,000 meals in less than five hours by utilizing gravity flow mechanisms to minimize human handling of food, mechanized high-speed cutting of vegetables and conveyor belts for easy transportation. All raw materials are accepted only after Quality Inspection in order to meet Food Safety Standards Act. Till date, twelve of the Akshaya Patra kitchens have received FSMS ISO 22000:2005 certification.

The cooked food is packed in steam sterilised customized transport vehicles which have a puffed body that will reduce temperature loss and a honeycomb structure to hold the vessels upright and keep the freshness of the cooked meal intact.

Logistic charting and GPRS are used to ensure safe and quick delivery of cooked food to schools. Route simulation software is used to minimize fuel consumption and cost. The kitchen technology implements Kaizen, CI Projects and Six Sigma methodologies to ensure precision and quality. Training is an integral part of efficient use of technology. Training on 5S, GMP, Lean and Kaizen, and ISO 22000 awareness are given for kitchen employees.

Akshaya Patra kitchens have adopted several environmentally friendly practices. There are solar plants to reduce dependency on bio-fuels Most of the kitchen uses Briquette run boilers, fuelled by groundnut husk or rice bran instead of diesel. Rain water is harvested and re-routed into a pond, recharging bore-wells and reducing dependency on water. Recycling of water is done using Effluent Treatment Plant (ETP) and the waste water is used for washing vehicles used to transport the food. . ‘Bio Oorja’ kitchen stoves that use biomass pellets as fuel are used which helped in minimizing fuel cost by 50%. Smokeless stoves are being piloted to reduce the dependency on LPG. In some kitchens, furnace is being fed with briquettes, which are made from bagasse, the fibrous by-product of the sugarcane industry which is being efficiently used here as bio-fuel.

Technological innovation measures are implemented that has the capacity to produce 70 units of power a day which is used to run all the applications in the kitchen. The plant runs through the use of photovoltaic cells that convert sunlight to direct current electricity. LED lights have been installed in the kitchens that are extremely energy efficient.

Akshaya Patra reaches out to millions of children in 24 locations across 10 states of India, providing them with freshly cooked meal on all school days. The mechanized kitchen can efficiently cook nutritious meals for multitudes of children at a low-cost and also very hygienically which has been designed and engineered to optimize quality and minimize cost, time and labour. This not-for-profit organisation has been conferred as the world’s largest NGO-run mid-day meal programme that utilizes innovative technology, smart engineering and good management to reach and continue to grow its current levels of service delivery and keep costs low. Technology has been brought in wherever possible to cut down costs, bring in speed and scale up operations. The application of technology in Akshaya Patra's kitchens has helped the organisation in reaching out to more and more children and it can feed 5 million children by 2020.

Akshaya Patra as an NGO in Ahmedabad

The purpose of human life is to serve, and to show compassion and the will to help others.                        

                                                                                                                              - Albert Schweitzer

Our life on earth is counted by the virtuous deeds we do for others.  We may not be able to help everyone but we can do something to help someone. There are many ways to support those who are in need like donating to charity, lending a helping hand to non-profit organisations or sponsoring a child etc.

We know that in government schools most of the children tend to be drop-outs when hunger remains a constraint. The performance of a student in class is directly dependant on the nutrition he/she is getting. Most of the children come with empty stomachs and doesn’t have the energy to concentrate in class. They lose interest in studies and end as drop outs. The non-profit organisations like Akshaya Patra serves mid-day meals to children in government schools with continuous support from the Central Government and the State Governments operating on a Public-Private-Partnership model. Education reports claims that in Gujarat, 58 of every 100 students who enrolled in schools are dropouts failing to make it to high schools, which is the 16th highest dropout rate in the country.

The non-profit organisation serves nutritious mid-day meals across 10 states of India. One among the states where Akshaya Patra serves mid-day meals is Gujarat and in the state, Ahmedabad is one of the locations where the NGO runs its programme. Ahmedabad has one of the largest kitchens in India with the capacity to prepare for 400,000 children. Currently as an NGO in Ahmedabad, it is feeding 132,581 children in 524 schools each day. The centralised kitchen spreads over two acres in a 3 storeyed building producing 200,000 meals in five hours. The hot, nutritious meals are delivered across the schools through 44 meal distribution vehicles. The kitchen was inaugurated by Honourable Chief Minister of Gujarat, Anandiben on August 2014. She said, “I strongly believe the mid-day meal from The Akshaya Patra Foundation will fulfil the goal of making Gujarat free of malnutrition. I hope the healthy and nutritious food provided to children from Akshaya Patra will build healthy minds and body. The Gujarat government is eager to support Akshaya Patra’s activities to build a strong society and a strong nation. I wish success to all the people working in the new centralized kitchen of The Akshaya Patra Foundation.” 

To prevent the dropout rates in schools, Akshaya Patra serves meals to the children with the aim of promoting education.  Meals are served keeping in mind the local taste of each region. The menu consisting of roti, peanut rice, jeera rice, mix veg curry with soy chunk, vegetables, mix dal consisting of masoor dal , channa dal,  lots of vegetables, kichdi  etc. are served to the children of Ahmedabad. Unlimited food is served keeping in mind their requirements. For some of the children, the noon meal may be the only proper meal they get a day. The kitchen has a food safety and quality control laboratory that has high-precision testing instruments to enhance quality and safety of the meal.

The other centres in Gujarat where the NGO serves food are Vadodara and Surat. As a result of the quality and nutritious food served, children are interested in coming to school, the enrolment in schools has increased, and micronutrient deficiencies are solved. Parents are happy to send their children to schools as they get a proper meal a day.

Today Akshaya Patra is the world’s largest mid-day meal programme serving wholesome food to over 1.5 million children from 11,360 schools across 10 states in India. Akshaya Patra plays an effective role in promoting education by providing nutritious meals to children in Government schools.

For Akshaya Patra to keep providing these children with nutritious food for education every day and expand its reach to help more children, the organisation needs support and participation from people, corporates, philanthropists and the generous donors. Contributions as donation to NGO can be done in many ways. One can donate to this charity online, which is considered the easiest method of all.