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Fighting Food Insecurity at the University of the Free State

10 March 2022 | Story Anthony Mthembu | Photo Unsplash

Food security — The No Student Hungry team gearing up to start distributing food parcels to the selected students.

The UFS is one of the many institutions of higher learning where food insecurity is an active issue. However, the No Student Hungry Programme is one of the initiatives launched at the university to assist in fighting food insecurity at the institution.

The purpose of the programme

Since its inception in 2011, the initiative has assisted many students in acquiring a healthy meal. Additionally, the Food Environment Office also hands out food packages, so that students can continue to achieve academically. “We are trying to develop a healthy environment for students and make it easier for them to have a nice and healthy meal,” stated Annelize Visagie, who heads the Food Environment Office at the UFS. The Food Environment programme is spread out on all three campuses, each with its own facilitators. Furthermore, the programme mainly caters for students who are not funded by the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) but who are excelling academically. The abovementioned students apply for assistance online, and a list is then drawn up of students who receive assistance for the year.

Alternative solutions to keep the initiative running

On the Bloemfontein Campus, the No Student Hungry Programme will be catering for 200 students in the 2022 academic year, assisting them with a daily nutritious meal. Additional food parcels are also handed out to provide further assistance. “We give food parcels to the students on the list every Tuesday and Thursday at the Thakaneng Bridge,” Visagie highlighted. However, she argues that catering for the student population through this programme can be a challenge, as the demand for assistance is growing rapidly and the ability to assist is limited. The programme relies on partnerships and sponsors to assist the student body. In fact, the coordinators of the programme currently have a memorandum of understanding with Tiger Brands according to which they deliver around 100 food parcels for distribution.

In addition, the coordinators have put in place alternative measures to ensure that they can provide more food to students. “The Kovsie Act Office, in partnership with the Department of Sustainable Food Systems and Development, has started a food garden where healthy and nutritious produce are grown, in order to add value to the distribution,” she indicated. Although the programme can only assist to a point, students who are in desperate need of assistance are never turned away. In fact, the Social Support Unit at Thakaneng Bridge usually assists students with food vouchers for a maximum of four days.

A commitment to teaching healthy eating habits

The programme is not only committed to curbing food insecurity, but also to ensuring that students have a healthy and balanced diet. As such, a booklet is being issued by the Department of Nutrition and Dietetics in collaboration with the Department of Sustainable Food Systems and Development, which contains ways in which students can make a healthy meal using some of the ingredients offered in the food parcels.

“We want to teach students how to eat healthy in the cheapest way, because they don’t have a lot of money to buy expensive food products,” Visagie argued.

News Archive

Statement regarding pulping of books by the UFS Sasol Library

2017-12-07

With reference to reports in the media and social media since 5 December 2017 about the pulping of books by the UFS Sasol Library, the executive management of the University of the Free State (UFS) would like to put the matter into perspective.

The book collection of the library is governed by a Library Committee of Senate, and no books can be removed from the library without formal approval from the committee. The university values the wealth of knowledge preserved in the library, and will not act irresponsibly with its collection.

Although the executive management takes note of the comments of some concerned organisations and members of the public in the media and social media the past couple of days, no books were removed from the library and sent to be pulped – only bound journals of which the university has online versions. These are journals that have been removed from the journal section for quite some time, and have not been used for a considerable number of years.

The decision to reduce the size of the collection to at least 35%, and to secure remote storage in close proximity of the library in Bloemfontein for some of the collections, was taken after a thorough external review of the library in 2014 as well as a gap review this year.

Two aspects were actioned after the review: books which have not been used at all in the past 20 years were moved to a storeroom in the library; journals removed from the journal section which have not been used actively for quite some time and which are not available online or cannot be found elsewhere through any means, will be moved to a remote storage in Bloemfontein and be retrieved as the need arises.

The only journals sent for pulping were those readily available online through current subscriptions, journals that the library is not subscribed to but are freely available online, journals that have since become Open Access Journals, magazines that have popular titles and are of no academic value, annual reports of societies and associations, and some abstracts. Thorough and responsible evaluation of these bound journals was done before they were sent for pulping.

The move of the books to a store room in the library and the removal of the bound journals will provide space to implement recommendations by the task team assigned by the Rector and Vice-Chancellor, Prof Francis Petersen, to investigate repurposing the library into a world-class, state-of-the-art library where physical and virtual space is created to support multi-purpose learning spaces for students, collaborative and group learning, and providing space for more innovation in the library through technology, thus enhancing the overall student and user experience.

Released by:
Lacea Loader (Director: Communication and Brand Management)
Telephone: +27 51 401 2584 | +27 83 645 2454
Email: news@ufs.ac.za | loaderl@ufs.ac.za
Fax: +27 51 444 6393

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