2024: Tackling crises through school meals programs

In our latest blog, Arlene Mitchell, Executive Director of the Global Child Nutrition Foundation in Seattle, examines the concept of innovation in the context of of global crises, and whether school meals can be a catalyst for change. 

As International School Meals Day (March 14 this year) draws near, I have been pondering its theme “Innovation in School Meals: new routes to sustainable nutrition”. The pondering is through a global lens, with particular concern for school meals in low-income, food insecure environments.

Part of me wants to scream “There are wars, there are political divisions, climate change is wreaking havoc around the world, the number of hungry people is increasing, and we have not yet recovered from a pandemic: Is this really the time to be talking about school meals and innovation? How can we talk about sustainable nutrition in the face of climate change, food prices, supply chain disruptions, and a global reliance on just three food crops—maize, rice, and wheat? How can we talk about innovation in a time of such need?

“Well,” the school meal-knowledgeable side of me responds, “we know that necessity is the catalyst of change, of innovation. And we know that school meals are a wonderful platform for innovation. So, let’s innovate now to take advantage this great platform to tackle these crises!”

1. The school food market is large and predictable, and its demands for safe and nutritious foods can change the agricultural sector. This market can demand “climate-smart foods,” based on commodities that reduce carbon emissions or that sequester carbon. Purchasing school food locally, near to where students will consume it can reduce both the monetary and the planetary cost of transporting food over long distances; home-grown and farm-to-school programs encourage local production and purchasing.

Let’s get to work getting those foods into school meals, which requires working on the supply side to ensure healthy, climate-smart foods are available in sufficient quantity and quality for the school food market. On the demand side, let’s be sure that children—and their parents—understand, like, and ask for climate-smart foods. Let’s also develop better and shorter transport systems. If we can land and effectively use vehicles on the moon and Mars, we can surely develop better, more cost-effective systems for moving foods—even fresh foods–from farms to schools in remote communities around the world.

2.Unemployment is a global challenge. The lack of paid work is particularly critical for women and youth, and the lack of paid jobs for youth is at a crisis point. School food programs employ large numbers of people, and the demand for talent can spur training and employment opportunities, putting even relatively low-skilled people–women and youth included—to work. Job creation creates economic development and promotes political stability. Training youth and women in the school food supply chain can bring quick and lasting understanding of basic food safety and nutrition principles that radiate beyond the schools and into communities and households.

Innovations needed in this area: Better training and pay for food service workers. Apprenticeships and other entry-level programs for youth and women to qualify and get into the profession. Mentoring, coaching, and upward mobility programs for food service workers. Let’s find ways to engage and coordinate actions across relevant government entities, the private sector, and other partners to spread the costs and the benefits of employing youth and women in school meal programs around the world.

3. School meal programs reduce hunger and improve educational outcomes for school-age children. Hunger and malnutrition are at the root of poor health; trigger antisocial behavior; and inhibit learning. Illiteracy and hunger perpetuate cycles of poverty, malnutrition, and ill health across generations.

Education, on the other hand, is the closest thing to a “silver bullet” for curing most of society’s ills. Education is critical to innovation, to sustainability in all its senses, and to good nutrition and health. Yet large numbers of preschool-aged children are not well nourished or school-ready and too many school-aged children do not attend school due to personal/family challenges, such a poverty, disability, insecurity/safety concerns, long distances between homes and schools, pregnancy, early marriage, and more.

Let’s find new, cost-effective ways to better nourish and prepare preschool children for their formal education. Let’s invest in innovative ways to allow school-aged, but out-of-school children to access a decent education. Let’s improve school conditions, particularly as relevant to food safety and nutrition. Let’s improve distance learning options for those who cannot physically attend school and find ways to support their nutrition in the process.

4. Children and youth are the key to change and to saving the planet. They are chafing to do so. They are motivated: Their lives and the lives of their own children are most affected by the fallout of climate change, conflict, and disease outbreaks.

Let’s support their initiatives and innovations. Let’s relinquish some of our power, priorities, and egos to give them space and agency to act. Let’s give them the nourishment that they need and the time and space it takes to truly have meals—not just eat. Let’s open our minds to their ideas and their need to act. Whether it is planting school gardens and trees, identifying, and protecting nutritious local plant species, bringing back nutritious traditional meals, using technology in ways we haven’t yet thought of, let’s use the school meal platform to turbo charge and support youthful energy to urgently address the escalating dangers threatening the future of food and our planet.

Famous automaker and innovator Henry Ford reportedly said, “I’m looking for a lot of people who have an infinite capacity to not know what can’t be done.” I think schoolchildren and their school meal providers constitute a very large group of people who don’t take “it can’t be done” seriously. So, as my favorite school meal champion was famous for saying, “Onward!” We wish everyone a great International School Meals Day and an innovative year ahead.

Read more about the work of the Global Child Nutrition Foundation at www.gcnf.org