- An assurance of what to eat will make a student at ease.
- The government of Tanzania has given that assurance to the undergraduates in the country.
- A specified sum of money will be given to the students daily to cater for their feeding and aid learning.
From the following fiscal year, undergraduates drawn from different tertiary Schools in Tanzania will begin to collect 10, 000 Tanzanian Shillings daily to cater for their meals. The allowance, an increase from the previous 8, 500 shillings, was announced in Parliament Dodoma, on the 5th of April 2023, by Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa while delivering budgetary estimations for his office for the 2023/24 financial year.
The Samia Scholarship has also helped the government provide money to female students, numbering 244, who excelled in the form six examinations and are admitted to study courses in the disciplines of engineering, medicine, technology, and mathematics. “The government has also continued to provide loans, increase the scope of access to higher education loans, and at the same time improve the higher education institution infrastructure in the year 2022/23, Sh654 billion was allocated for student loans, an increase from Sh570 billion which was allocated in 2021/22, with a number of beneficiaries increasing from 177,605 in 2021/22 to 202,877 in 2022/23,” Prime Minister Majaliwa said.
To cushion the burden of some students who may skip meals due to financial constraints, consequently losing concentration in school or left with the option of running indecent enterprises so as to survive, a leader of the Tanzania Higher Learning Institutions Students’ Organization (Tahliso), Mr Frank Mkinda, on the 11th of February, called on the government to increase the amount: “Due to the rising cost of living, we kindly ask for your consideration by raising the daily allowances to at least Sh10, 000 or more.” Mkinda had made this request in a meeting, at the State House Dodoma, between the students’ organization and the first female President of Tanzania, President Samia Suluhu Hassan. She declared that the stipend would improve; she directed the minister of education to commence work on the subject.
The President said, “I understand that one has to survive on a single meal when he or she finishes his or her daily food allowance. I will start with at least Sh10,000. So, the minister for education will work on the matter, come next academic year.”