The Western Cape government has allocated an additional R53 million in funding for emergency food relief programmes that will run across the province.
Provincial Treasury approved the allocation of the funds on Saturday.
Premier Alan Winde said they have taken a number of emergency steps to ensure that residents in the Western Cape are being fed.
He said the allocation of funds for the emergency food provision plan includes R20 million to distribute 50, 000 food parcels, each of which will support a family of four for one month.
The provincial social development department will allocate the funds to selected non-governmental organisations to prepare and distribute the food parcels.
That department will also get an additional R5 million for delivery of 10,000 cooked meals per day for one month.
The Western Cape education department will receive R18 million to initiate a special school feeding program this month, which will target the 485 000 existing school feeding scheme beneficiaries, with one takeaway meal a day, at approximately 1, 000 schools.
The premier said they want to ensure that no-one goes hungry during this period and that everyone’s able to play their part to stop the spread of the coronavirus.