In a move to transform the way Filipino students receive their daily meals, Rep. Brian Poe of the FPJ Panday Bayanihan Party-List has filed House Bill No. 2191, or the ‘National School Feeding Cloud Kitchens Act.’
The bill proposes a centralized, professionally managed system called the National School Feeding Cloud Kitchen System (NSFCKS)-to prepare and deliver safe, nutritious meals to schools nationwide, relieving teachers of non-teaching duties like cooking and procurement.
Currently, many public school teachers are burdened with food preparation, procurement, and even cooking for the School-Based Feeding Program, tasks that fall far outside their core responsibility of teaching. HB 2191 addresses this by establishing strategically located School Feeding Cloud Kitchens that will handle meal production at scale, ensuring consistent quality, food safety, and cost efficiency through economies of scale.
The bill also creates a National School Feeding Council, composed of key agencies-including the Department of Education (DepEd, Department of Health (DOH), DSWD, Department of Agriculture (DA), and DOST-FNRI, as well as local government units, parents, teachers, and private sector partners. This council will develop a national master plan, set nutrition and safety standards, and foster public-private partnerships to ensure long-term sustainability.
As Poe emphasized in his sponsorship speech: ‘Teachers will be fully relieved from food preparation and procurement. Their role will be to supervise meal distribution and integrate nutrition education into their teaching, allowing them to focus on what they do best: educating our children.’
The Cloud Kitchen System is not just about food, it’s about building a modern, efficient, and accountable national feeding program that supports both student health and teacher effectiveness. HB 2191 complements House Bill No. 1193, which expands the National Feeding Program to include secondary school students. HB1193 amends the Masustansyang Pagkain para sa sa Batang Pilipino Act to ensure that undernourished learners from kindergarten through Grade 12 receive at least one fortified meal daily for 120 days each year.
As Rep. Poe notes in his speech, ‘According to the World Bank, childhood undernutrition cost the Philippine economy around USD 4.4 billion, equivalent to 1.5% of our GDP in 2015,’ and ‘the Expanded National Nutrition Survey of the Food and Nutrition Research Institute reveals that adolescents aged 10 to 19 years old, especially those in rural areas and poor households, show higher rates of stunting and malnutrition than their urabn counterparts.’
He added, ‘This period-adolescence-is a critical stage for growth, learning, and emotional development. Yet, many of our secondary students attend class hungry, struggling to focus, and unable to perform to their full potential.’
Together, these bills ensure that ‘every Filipino learner-from kindergarten to senior high school-has access to nutritious meals that support both body and mind.’