For 18 primary and elementary schools in Juja, Kenya, school lunches are an investment with a huge return – the equivalent of nine dollars in benefits for each dollar invested.

At 4 a.m. each school day, in a centralized kitchen run by Food4Education, kitchen workers chop bags of onions, carrots, tomatoes and cabbages to add to lentils, beans, or rice. The kitchen – which the Guardian describes as “the largest green kitchen in Africa” – provides daily nutritious meals for 60,000 students at preschool and elementary schools in Nairobi.