German Development Minister Reem Alabali-Radovan presented Kenyan social entrepreneur Wawira Njiru with the German Africa Award on Wednesday evening. Njiru, 35, was honored for her work with Food4Education (F4E), the organization she founded to provide school meals to children in Kenya. What began as a modest fundraiser for just 25 schoolchildren has grown into a major social enterprise with 6,000 employees, now feeding 730,000 children every day.

"Her commitment reminds us all that if hunger is man-made, people can also overcome hunger," Alabali-Radovan said in her laudation.

For Njiru, who was visiting Germany for the first time, the award was a particularly special honor. She said it was also an incentive for her and her team to take their work beyond Kenya's borders and into other African countries. Plans to expand the programme to six countries are already under way.

How did this remarkable transformation come about?

The answer may lie in her character. Stubborn and hardworking – that's how Njiru sees herself. "It's hard to tell me something is not possible."

Thinking back to how she began, she explained: "My dream then, my ambition was to feed 100 kids every day. I was 21 years old then, so having an ambition of feeding 100 kids felt momentous. But as you grow older and realize that you can do more, you become obsessed with the question: 'How much more can you do? How much more can you do?' That led me here."

Njiru left her native Kenya after finishing school to study nutrition science in Adelaide, Australia.

Connecting the dots

"I knew a lot of kids back home were not getting the education they needed. At that time, I was learning about the impact of food, and I didn't realize how powerful food was," Njiru said.

"When you're doing a nutrition degree, that's when you really learn about the science behind food. And you realize that, especially for kids, it's so critical that they get nutritious meals."

When she found out her friends at the university often had a few dollars to spare and were looking for ways to contribute, she connected the dots and started her first fundraiser.

From there, the trajectory was set. But the road was rough at times for the young woman, Njiru explained. Some people didn't take her seriously. Others did.

"You have to find your believers," Njiru learned. "You can't just go with your own name. You have to find someone to vouch for you or someone or something to validate your presence."

Her degree certainly helped. But still, many men looking for jobs just didn't seem confident about working for a young woman. This is why more than 70% of her employees today are women, Njiru said.

School meals at 3 cents, digitally tracked

Steadily pushing the limits, Food4Education now provides 19,000 schools across Kenya with meals for more than 730,000 children every day. The system relies on a mix of funding: through donations and government support, parents are left with a small contribution, which in some cases amounts to 5 Kenyan shillings (3 euro cents).

Payment is processed through the so-called "Tap-to-Eat" system. Every child has a wristband that is used to track each meal. The wristbands not only track parents' payments, but they also help document how many meals are actually served. And if children don't pick up their meals, the team can find out why.

The model also relies on local sources wherever possible. About 80% of the food the organization distributes comes from small-scale farmers. This way, school meals are prepared with fresh ingredients – and farmers have a reliable market for selling their produce.

"For a long time, school meals were viewed as charity. We've proven that it's economic infrastructure," Njiru said.

Boosting attention and morale among schoolchildren

Does it pay off? It seems so. Data show that children at participating schools miss fewer classes and also perform better at school.

"Food is everything," said Raphaera Kanya, director of a primary school in Kenya's capital, Nairobi. "When your stomach is empty, you cannot understand anything in class."

To Jane Nyambura, a pupil, the school feeding programme fosters equality at school.

"There was a difference because there are some students who find accessing food very easy because their parents are well off," she said.

"There are others who can't afford food, and they feel as if it's unfair, as if there's something lacking in them. So it really demoralizes them and reduces their confidence."

Njiru has already set her sights on the next benchmark: reaching 1 million schoolchildren every day. She has every reason to be confident, it seems.

"From 25 kids to now, I feel like there's not one challenge that we haven't overcome."

The German Africa Prize is awarded by the German Africa Foundation (DAS), a nonpartisan foundation dedicated to promoting a nuanced view of Africa in political circles and among the German public.

Since 1993, it has awarded the German Africa Prize to individuals from African countries whose ideas and work inspire solutions to global issues of the future beyond their countries of origin. The award has gone to outstanding individuals in Zimbabwe, Cameroon and Sierra Leone in recent years.

German Development Minister Reem Alabali Radovan will present the  German Africa Prize to Kenya's successful social entrepreneur on Wednesday evening.

This article was originally published in German and updated on November 5, 2026.