Learners in Bushbuckridge are 'taking turns to eat' as families struggle to feed them

23 Mar 2025

Learners in Mpumalanga are said to take turns eating at home as families struggle to afford food for the whole family. Millions of children rely on the Child Support Grant and the national school nutrition programme to meet their basic needs, yet many still face hunger and malnutrition, impeding their ability to learn and thrive.

When Nomsa* heard that a nine-year-old Grade 4 learner had been complaining of stomach aches, it was a scenario she had become all too familiar with.

“It’s heartbreaking to watch. On any given day, we see children coming into the sick bay with complaints of tummy aches – only to find out they didn’t eat the night before or this morning.”

This grim reality is not unique to one child or school, but affects the entire community. Nomsa, who works at a school in Bushbuckridge, one of Mpumalanga’s most impoverished areas, is all too familiar with the struggles children face when they arrive at school hungry. With an unemployment rate of 50.1% and more than 85% of the population living below the poverty line, for many families in Bushbuckridge, the economic landscape is unforgiving.

With most residents earning less than R19,200 a year, the fight to make ends meet is relentless, and too often children pay the price. Most come from families that rely on Child Support Grants, said Nomsa.

A lifeline but is it sufficient?

The Child Support Grant (CSG) in South Africa effectively reaches a significant number of children living in poverty, with 13 million out of 20 million children receiving this crucial support through their primary caregivers.

The grant is aimed at low-income households to help caregivers meet a child’s basic needs and it has the best pro-poor targeting record of all the existing social grants.

However, a 2023 report by the Children’s Institute at the University of Cape Town revealed a critical shortfall: the grant’s R500 value at the time was inadequate to shield the most vulnerable children from destitution as it was too low to address hunger, malnutrition and stunting. Nearly eight million children still live below the food poverty line, defined as the cost of the minimum daily food required for energy needs. In 2025, this line was R796 per person per month.

In February 2025, Stephen Devereux from the Institute of Development Studies, Busiso Moyo from the University of the Western Cape and Mark Heywood from the University of Cape Town published an article calling for an immediate increase in the CSG to R1,634, with subsequent adjustments. This amount is the minimum needed to meet essential needs such as nutritious food, clothing, and shelter.

During his budget speech on 12 March, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana announced an increase in social grants, including a R30 (5.6%) boost to the Child Support Grant, bringing it to R560 a month. With inflation at 3.2%, the higher-than-inflation increases are meant to help cushion grant beneficiaries against the VAT increase. But is this figure truly enough to sustain a child in communities such as Bushbuckridge where most residents earn less than R19,200 a year?

Nomsa said she hoped the increase would alleviate the frequent hunger-related problems she witnessed at school. She recalled an instance where siblings explicitly stated that it “wasn’t one of their turns to take lunch to school” due to the stark reality that their grandmother, caring for multiple children, simply lacked the financial resources to provide daily meals for all of them.

Read more: Social grant allocations lower than the pre-Budget

Malnutrition’s toll

The pervasive issue of hunger presents significant obstacles to effective learning, with studies indicating that hunger can impair cognition, memory, and long-term brain development, consequently widening the achievement gap among students.

Elmien Crofford, an Associate Professor at North West University (NWU) and child protection social worker, stated that depriving a child of food or a balanced diet can lead to a range of psychological, physical and behavioural issues, both short- and long-term. The timing of these effects varies depending on each child’s unique genetic makeup.

“If a child is not getting the nutrition they need, there could be psychological consequences, such as anxiety, irritability and concentration levels are impacted. When you can’t concentrate, you can’t adhere to classroom rules, you won’t be in a position to perform your best academically and this puts the child now at an academic disadvantage, but at the same time, immediately, may start influencing the social functioning of the child,” she said.

Crofford recalled instances where children, as a behavioural consequence of malnutrition, may resort to criminal behaviour. Driven by hunger pains, children end up stealing food, whether from classmates, a nearby tuck shop, or even from someone carrying groceries. She emphasised that when a child engaged in delinquent, oppositional, or criminal behaviour, it should trigger an alarm for adults to consider what’s happening at home.

“Children are innocent, even those who steal food – they do it for a reason, often because they’re hungry.”

While not all food theft stems from hunger, Crofford, as a practitioner, has witnessed it first-hand. She said society often responded with punishment and judgment, failing to recognise that these children acted out of desperation. This misunderstanding was often fuelled by people’s own struggles, which led to a harsh, punitive reaction.

Livhuwani Siaga, a statutory social worker and part-time lecturer at NWU, explained that not receiving adequate nutrition could affect a child’s behaviour in ways that even teachers might not understand. A previously well-behaved, high-performing child might suddenly start acting out or bullying others.

“The child’s own wellbeing as well is affected because this child comes from a home with little food and roughly R500 which we can agree is not enough. As a result, there is no food at all, then you expect the child to perform in class, but they won’t be able to concentrate,” she said.

A recent report from the Children’s Institute has revealed that South Africa’s stunting rate has increased from 27% to 29% – this is due to malnutrition, a condition that directly affects their ability to learn in school and hold down employment as adults.

School meals: a lifeline for millions, but disruptions put students at risk

The National School Nutrition Programme (NSNP) provides meals to 9.7 million learners across South Africa, with the aim of supporting their learning through nutritious meals. The programme targets children in no-fee-paying schools (quintiles 1-3) and, when resources permit, extends to quintiles 4 and 5. The NSNP includes daily school meals, nutrition education and school food gardens to promote long-term food security.

However, the programme has faced significant challenges over the years, leading to disruptions in meal delivery. At its worst, this has resulted in numerous learners going without meals, as seen during the first month of school in 2025.

The closure of Ithala Bank has severely affected service providers in KwaZulu-Natal, leaving them unable to procure and deliver food to schools. This disruption has affected more than 2.4 million learners in 5,405 schools, with vulnerable children going without meals. In the uMngeni Municipality, local authorities had to use their own funds to ensure meals were provided to students in rural areas with roughly 1,800 learners affected.

Similarly, schools in the Northern Cape have struggled with delayed funding for their feeding schemes, leaving learners without their essential meals.

“For many, this programme provides the only meal they receive in a day. A simple plate of food can mean the difference between a child thriving in the classroom or dropping out altogether,” said a school principal from the Northern Cape, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of repercussions.

Holistic support beyond grants

Siaga said that despite receiving support from grants, some individuals found themselves in even deeper problems, often engaging in risky behaviour. During a home visit, a mother revealed that her CSG card was with a loan shark. She had borrowed money to supplement her income, but now, unable to repay it, the loan shark took her grant money each month instead of it going to her child.

Crofford echoed these concerns and said that child protection social workers in South Africa operated at various levels: prevention, early intervention, statutory intervention and aftercare or reunification.

However, due to the overwhelming crisis and challenging working conditions, including severe resource shortages, understaffing, low salaries, and moral distress, child protection social workers often focused only on severe abuse cases at a statutory level. This left little room for the critical prevention or early intervention needed in South Africa.

“The child support grant is great. It’s good. It supports those who need additional support.

“But how about we start focusing on preventing this great dependency on a grant and we help people with the relevant knowledge and skills to first lay the foundation for a happy and healthy home before having children. Family planning is essential,” she said. DM

*Not her real name.

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Maverick Citizen

A lifeline but is it sufficient?

Malnutrition’s toll

School meals: a lifeline for millions, but disruptions put students at risk

Holistic support beyond grants