Ebook Double dividend? Promoting good nutrition and sustainable consumption through healthy school meals
Public clamour for better school meals reached a peak in March 2005 after Jamie Oliver described in graphic detail, to a classroom of truculent London teenagers, the contents of chicken nuggets.
Responding to public demands for wholesale reform, the Government signalled a step change in school catering when it pledged in April 2005 to bring forward tougher school meals standards by the end of September 2005, to be implemented on a mandatory basis from the start of the next school year (2006-7) with support from a new ‘School Food Trust’. The Secretary of State for Education, Ruth Kelly, promptly established the School Meals Review Panel to advise on new standards for school meals. This panel recommended the adoption of the Caroline Walker Trust guidelines for school meals and the adoption of nine food based standards.
However, as this report and most especially the case studies in Section 6 illustrate, upgrading the food served in schools offers an opportunity to not only improve our children’s diet but also provide a critical opportunity to place the procurement of school food - a fifth of the ?1.8 billion total spend by the English public sector on food and catering - on a truly sustainable footing.
Over the long term the transformation of school meals will help ensure that our children mature into adults who not only appreciate the benefits of eating a balanced diet but recognise the importance and value of food produced in a sustainable way. This will help to develop an urgently needed positive food culture in England.
This report unpacks those opportunities, to examine in detail the double dividend to be reaped from the provision of healthy, nutritious school meals using meat, dairy, fish and vegetable produce from more sustainable sources.
Contents
Foreword
Introduction
Key recommendations for improving sustainability of school meals
Section 1. Environmental impacts of food consumption
- 1.1 Overview
1.2 Biodiversity impacts
1.3 Contribution to climate change
1.4 On-farm water and waste impacts
1.5 Food transport and distribution
1.6 Processing, packaging and food waste
1.7 The unsustainable impacts of conventional meat and dairy production
1.8 Animal feed
1.9 The sustainable alternative
1.10 Fish - the environmental impacts of marine fishing
1.11 Impacts of aquaculture
1.12 Promoting sustainable marine fishing
Section 2. Nutritional advice
- 2.1 Introduction to the Caroline Walker Trust guidelines
2.2 Fruit and vegetables
2.3 Meat
2.4 Dairy products
2.5 Vegetarian dishes
2.6 Fish
Section 3. Improving the sustainability of school meals – implications of nutritional standards
- 3.1 Key sustainability implications for CWT guidelines
3.2 Discussion of the sustainability implications of the CWT nutritional guidelines
3.3 Scenarios for sustainable school meals
3.4 How can we deliver a best case scenario?
Section 4. Costs, barriers and opportunities
- 4.1 Overview
4.2 Will new Government money for ingredients go far enough?
4.3 The cost of improvements
Section 5. Increasing uptake of sustainable school meals
- 5.1 Improving Catering Management
5.2 Developing Sustainable Procurement & Supply Chains
5.3 Valuing and measuring the sustainable school meals effectively
Section 6. Case studies
- 6.1 School Meals in Rome – The Quality Revolution
6.2 East Ayrshire – Scotland’s first Food for Life organic, local and fresh school meals service
6.3 Bradford – sustainable local procurement pioneer
6.4 Lethbridge Primary School, Swindon – Food for Life champion
6.5 Columbia Primary School
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