In many West African schools, canteens have long struggled to offer more than basic staples. Yet across Ouagadougou, Dakar, Thiaroye-sur-Mer, Thiès and Bobo-Dioulasso, Rikolto and partners are testing solutions to reshape school food environments. Through Rikolto’s Good Food at School initiative, nutrition is becoming part of the school day, while pupils’ health, local farming, and community engagement are increasingly linked.
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At Nongmikma A Primary School in Ouagadougou, 13 year old Abdul Razack Sana discovered gardening only a few months ago. “Before, I didn’t know how to harvest vegetables. I didn’t know how to grow or water plants,” he says. His experience reflects a wider shift: school gardens are now recognised globally, including by the FAO, as practical tools to help children understand where food comes from and what healthy eating looks like, especially in settings where canteen budgets are tight and meals rely heavily on cereals, oilseeds and legumes.
These meals fill stomachs but often lack vitamins needed by children aged 5 to 19, crucial years for growth and learning. As Nicolas Doyé in charge of Education Promotion of the Commune of Bobo Dioulasso notes, “The meals served in our school canteens aren’t exactly nutritionally rich. Many essential nutrients are missing.” According to UNICEF, globally, almost one in five school-aged adolescents eats vegetables less than once a day, while fast food continues to gain ground. In West Africa, the challenge is amplified by the steady presence of ultra processed, sugary snacks just outside school gates.
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To respond to these intertwined issues, Rikolto is working with local governments and 13 [CF2.1][SC2.2]schools across Burkina Faso and Senegal. Inspired by the Whole School Food Approach, Rikolto aims to connect several elements that shape children’s day to day food experience: clean kitchens, safer food storage, school gardens, nutrition awareness, community participation, and stronger governance. By 2025, thousands of pupils, teachers, cooks, parents, and vendors had taken part in activities shaped around these pillars.
Each school begins its journey with community led events—awareness-raising sessions on healthy eating, hygiene training, and collective work to set up school management committees and technical teams. This involves mobilising the entire school food community: pupils, parents, teachers, schools’ leadership, cooks, and street food vendors.
Momentum is building nationally. The government’s “one school, one borehole, one garden, one field, one school farm” initiative signals growing interest in linking education with agricultural and social policy. In this context, Rikolto collaborates closely with authorities in Bobo Dioulasso and Ouagadougou.
At the twin Nongmikma A and B schools, the garden has already become a central part of school life.
“We’re going to see the pretty vegetables—eggplants and young leaves—and then water them,” says 12 year old Florence Yago. “They will look beautiful, and then we’ll remove weeds.”
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“We take the children straight to the garden to observe first-hand. It makes discussions about agriculture come alive.”
Teachers also see the difference. “We take the children straight to the garden to observe first-hand,” explains Guy Modeste Tone. “It makes discussions about agriculture come alive.”
Elsewhere, at Soumaïla Barro school in Bobo Dioulasso, many pupils had never held a daba (a traditional hoe) before. Under their teachers’ guidance, they harvested onions, lettuce, cabbage, eggplant, and amaranth. Mr. Doyé from the Commune of Bobo-Dioulasso recalls the joy of the first harvest: "Onions... they had a fairly large quantity which significantly improved the meals since there is a canteen at the school." Meanwhile, the school banned plastic packaging altogether, and pupils themselves now refuse to buy food wrapped in plastic.
Children also learn about risks linked to common eating habits and discover underused local crops such as orange fleshed sweet potatoes. Simple food processing exercises—preparing juice, learning hygiene steps, handling utensils—make the lessons practical and enjoyable. Every pupil leaves with something they made themselves, reinforcing the pride and value of local foods.
In Dakar, Thiès, and Thiaroye Sur Mer, a similar approach is taking shape, strengthened by partnerships with women food vendors working near the schools. At Daniel Brottier School in Thiè, for instance, vendors and canteen cooks trained together, creating new recipes from local ingredients and building awareness about balanced nutrition.
In Thiaroye sur Mer, the week begins with a bowl of Fondé, a porridge made from local cereals. The “Ndekki Sama Fondé” initiative— led by the municipality—began at the Case des Tout Petits in 2018 and has been scaled from 2024 onwards to reach 28 schools, supported by Africa Human Challenge, Arimex, Pamecas, and Les Mamelles Jaboot.
Rikolto contributes through a pilot involving 122 children, supporting school leaders and management committees to improve menus and strengthen nutrition education. The pilot mobilises the entire educational, economic, and health community of Thiaroye sur Mer to prepare for long term scaling. The programme has already received the Local Leadership Excellence Award in the “Inclusion, Equity, Equality” category for its collaborative approach.
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In Ouagadougou, the AfriFOODlink project supported by the EU helped the municipality and local actors diagnose the city’s food system. One collective decision was to experiment with integrated school canteen management, inspired by early progress in Good Food at School pilots. Senegal is following a similar path through the expansion of Ndekki Sama Fondé.
These pilots create room for trial and error while building ownership among parents, teachers, street vendors, and local authorities. They also help identify practical constraints. In Ouagadougou, for instance, expanding the garden depends on securing a water pump. As one inspector observed, “The school needs support. We are in a vulnerable environment where children need guidance… and it’s not just the pupils; it’s the parents and teachers too.”
Despite such challenges, families are increasingly involved. In Senegal, parents contribute to a “community granary” to ensure vulnerable children can eat. In Burkina Faso, parents like Tasséré Ouedraogo see the value clearly: “We’re motivated by this—for the well being of the kids and for healthy eating.”
In 2026, activities will expand further. In Bobo Dioulasso, nutrition sessions centered on orange fleshed sweet potatoes are expected to reach five more schools. In Thiaroye sur Mer, scaling to 28 schools is underway with strong backing from municipal authorities and. As former project coordinator Anne Catherine Kane puts it, “In just a few months, attendance, grades, and health have all gone up. It makes us think it’s time to expand.”
Building on these early experiences, our ambition is now to develop a version of the Whole School Food Approach that fits the specific realities of West Africa—where school food environments are often informal and shaped by resource scarcity. Our goal is to activate multiple levers at once: school food environments, supply chains, pupils’ learning experiences, community engagement, and school food governance.
If you are interested in exploring this journey with us, please reach out toMs. Bernadette Ouattara, Regional Programme Director for West Africa – Good Food for Cities:bernadette.ouattara@rikolto.orgEdition assisted by Copilot.
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