MEALenium Project teams up with orgs to feed 600 undernourished children

MANILA, Philippines — Teenagers leading The MEALenium Project partnered with various stakeholders to push for a school-based feeding initiative for undernourished children.

The MEALenium Project co-founders Joshua Emmanuel Tan and Philip Sebastian Belmonte signed an agreement with  Jollibee Group Foundation, Department of Education Quezon City Schools Division and Lupang Pangako Elementary School to benefit close to 600 malnourished public  elementary students.

The new partners recently formalized the agreement for the first Busog, Lusog, Talino (BLT) Kitchen for the DepEd's school-based feeding program.

Part of the 1990 Millennium Development Goals  of the Philippines was to significantly decrease the percentage of underweight children in the country from 27 percent to 13.5 percent by 2015.  Although progress has been made in this regard, efforts have still fallen short.

In 2015, the percentage of underweight children under age 5 was still at 20 percent. With this situation in mind, the idea for The MEALenium Project was born.

Founded by two teenagers, Joshua Emmanuel Tan and Philip Sebastian "Basti" Belmonte, in partnership with Fr. Julio Cuesta, the parish priest of St. Benedict church, and the Payatas Orion Foundation, the MEALenium Project initialy aimed to provide nourishment to the impoverished young babies and children of St. Benedict, Payatas.

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