Memorandum from the Soil Association (WP
37)
SUMMARY AND
RECOMMENDATIONS
1. The Soil Association's Food for Life
report and action pack, published in 2003, launched the recent
public debate on the need to improve school meals. Through our
Food for Life programme the Soil Association has worked on changing
national policy so that the Government provides a more supportive
framework for school meal providers. The Food for Life programme
also delivers: practical work with schools to get unprocessed,
local and organic meals served in schools; education work to reconnect
pupils to food and where it comes from; and work on menus to meet
the Caroline Walker Trust guidelines for nutrition. To date, the
Soil Association is working directly with five local authorities
and 150 schools in England and Wales to implement these changes.
We are also working closely with the "Hungry for Success"
programme in Scotland.
2. School meals are the one area where Government
has the opportunity and responsibility to determine children's
diets. We know that eating patterns formed in childhood have a
long-term impact on adult diets and ultimately public health.
Our work and the work of others such as the Food Standards Agency
has shown that school meals are all too often too high in fat,
sugar and salt and low in essential nutrients. We welcome the
Government's announcements in the White Paper on school meals.
However, we are concerned about the contradictory statements made
in the White Paper on the introduction on nutrient-based standards
(in different places the Government say they "will"
or will "strongly consider" introducing nutrient-based
standards). It is essential that nutrient-based standards are
introduced in order to guarantee that children get the essential
nutrients they need and don't consume a diet too high in fat,
sugar and salt.
3. We recommend that the Health Committee
calls on the Government:
— to introduce nutrient-based standards
for primary and secondary schools as a matter of priority; and
— to make available sufficient funds
to fund an improvement in the quality of ingredients, adequate
staffing and staff training, and in some cases, the re-equipment
of school kitchens.
The Soil Association and organic food and farming
4. The Soil Association is the main organisation
of the organic movement in the UK, and also the main Government-approved
certifier for the UK organic sector, certifying 70% of the organic
food sold in the UK. Our responsibility for organic farming and
food is evident throughout the entire food chain, from consumers,
retailers, processors and wholesalers, to producers, researchers
and policy makers. Membership of the Soil Association charity
(over 25,000) includes members from every link in the chain and
we represent them all in working to develop the organic sector.
5. The objectives of organic farming are
the sustainable management of soil and the natural production
of healthy crops with high nutrient levels, to produce healthy
livestock, and healthy food for humans. This is achieved through
good soil management focussing on the maintenance of soil organic
matter levels and soil biological activity.
6. We hope that over time all farming and
food will switch to modern organic methods. This is currently
the only system that could in future allow us to feed ourselves
sustainably, without depleting non-renewable resources like soil,
fresh water and carbon. Certified organic farming accounts for
about 4% of UK farmland. The market for organic food is worth
over £1 billion, and is growing at 10% per annum. UK organic
farmland is supplying about 45% of this and the rest supplied
by imports. The Government's target is for 70% of the organic
market to be sourced from UK farmers by 2010. Local and direct
organic sales (through farm shops, box schemes and farmers' markets,
and to local schools, pubs and restaurants) are growing at 16%
per annum. An increase in the area of organic farming is one of
the Government's "quality of life" indicators. The DEFRA
action plan for organic farming, adopted in 2002, and updated
in 2004, supports the development of the sector.
7. In the EU, 13% of Austria's farmland
is organic, with market growth running at 11%, and Germany's annual
market for organic food is twice the UK's, at £2.1billion.
The world-wide market for organic food is worth £15 billion;
the US market (the largest in the world) has grown at between
17 and 22% in recent years, compared to just 2 to 3% growth in
non-organic food, and is expected to be worth $32.3 billion by
2009.
8. DEFRA, English Nature, the Royal Society
for the Protection of Birds and others have published peer-reviewed
papers setting out in detail the sustainability and biodiversity
benefits of organic farming. The Food Standards Agency have said
that consumers wishing to avoid pesticide residues in food or
to buy sustainable food can buy organic, and English Nature wants
to see more organic farming because there is more wildlife on
organic farms. There is good evidence that organic farming conserves
rather than depletes soils (as is the case with some non-organic
farming). The Government accepts the sustainability, biodiversity
and animal welfare benefits of organic farming, and the Government's
policy on sustainable public procurement includes encouraging
the purchase of organic food for those reasons.
Whether the proposals will enable the Government
to achieve its public health goals
9. School meals is the one area where the
Government is responsible for what the most vulnerable group,
young children, eat. It is an area where the state has to, and
does, act as "nanny", as children in school, and especially
in primary schools, are effectively in the care of the Department
of Education and Skills, and the standards determining what they
get to eat are set by DfES. Eating habits formed in primary schools
will either reinforce healthy eating, or set a pattern which children
will take with them to secondary schools, and maybe for the rest
of their lives. Of all the areas where the Government can take
action to improve the nation's diet and health, reforming school
meals is the key. This is the only time that Government action
will definitely change the diets of children in an effective way.
10. The Department of Health's (DH) Consultative
Document, "Choosing Health? Choosing a Better Diet",
states that: "Action in schools can impact on key health
outcomes", and notes that effective "school-based interventions
to reduce obesity and overweight in schoolchildren, particularly
girls" include "the modification of school meals and
tuckshops".
11. With the move for schools to open between
8 am and 6 pm food provision in schools will becomes even more
relevant to child health as increasing number of children will
eat breakfast, lunch and an early evening snack in the Government's
care.
12. The Soil Association therefore warmly
welcomes the Government decisions set out in the White Paper to
invest over the next three years to improve nutrition in schools
by:
— revising both primary and secondary
school meals standards to reduce the consumption of fat, salt
and sugar and to increase the consumption of fruit and vegetables
and other essential nutrients;
— strongly considering the introduction
of nutrient-based standards that will be taken into account in
Ofsted inspections;
— subject to legislation, extending
the new standards to cover food across the school day, including
vending machines and tuck shops;
— providing new guidance on food procurement
for heads and governors, and improving training and support for
school meal providers and catering staff; and
— developing the Healthy Schools
Programme to include policies on healthy and nutritious food.
13. In the 1980s nutritional standards for
school meals were abolished, and the current Government eventually
replaced them with guidelines which do not specify, for example,
vitamin or nutrient content, or place limits on fat, sugar or
salt. There are excellent nutritional standards, developed by
the Caroline Walker Trust, for primary school lunches, but DfES
only attaches these as guidelines to their current nutritional
advice. The difference in the two sets of standards is shown in
the attached illustrative menus, one that meets the Government's
current standards, the other that meets the Caroline Walker Trust
standards.
January 2005
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