Delivering Sustainability Towards the Creative Procurement of School Meals
Lead Researchers: Prof Kevin Morgan, Roberta Sonnino, Mara Miele.
Background:
In many countries, particularly in Europe, something of a ‘moral panic’ has broken out around food, health and obesity. In the UK, the most tangible signs of this growing concern are two seminal reports: the Curry Report of Farming and Food (2002) and the Obesity Report (2004). Published in the aftermath of a series of food scares, the Curry Report focuses on food production to provide guidelines for nurturing a re-localized and sustainable agri-food sector. The Obesity Report, in turn, suggests solutions in the context of food consumption to address the devastating effects of the ‘obesity epidemics’ on national health and the economy. Significantly, both documents emphasize the role that public procurement, and especially school meals, can play at both ends of the food chain by developing markets for local producers (Policy Commission, 2002:104) and by promoting healthy eating habits that tackle obesity (House of Commons, 2004:68-70)
There is a need for a critical assessment of the scope for and the limits to sustainable public procurement in the context of the school meals system in Italy and the UK, where ‘healthy eating’ initiatives are underway to improve children’s diets. Creative procurement as a means of integrating the supply and demand sides of the agri-food chain to respond to concerns about obesity and healthy eating for children is one way forward. Some Italian Local Authorities are regarded as leaders in the provision of healthy school meals, and there are some Local Authorities in the UK that are also making substantial efforts to address concerns at the current time. The prospects for school meals depend on a combination of local and non-local factors. Key non-local factors include EU public procurement regulations and national food culture and national regulations. The main local factors include the local socioeconomic environment and the political commitment to sustainable development at the municipal level.
There were a number of components to the research. First, an examination of the changing regulatory context of public procurement in the EU was carried out. Second, a comparative study of school meals in the UK and Italy within the different political contexts was undertaken. Third, five case studies were undertaken using local authorities as the unit of analysis. Five places were chosen: 2 from Italy (Rome and Piombino, a small town in Tuscany) and 3 from the UK (South Gloucestershire, Carmarthenshire and East Ayrshire).
The main source of data was semi-structured and in-depth interviews with key actors in the EU, Member State and at Local Authority levels, along with documentary analysis of documented material and grey literature, and two focus groups in two schools in each case study (one with children and one with parents and teachers).
Key Research Questions
• Does the reform of public procurement regulations in the EU facilitate ‘greener’, more sustainable public procurement policies, and how will it affect the prospects for purchasing local and ‘quality’ food in schools?
• In particular, how does the tension between competitive and sustainability criteria play out in practice?
• How do we explain diversity in a supposedly uniform EU regulatory regime?
• What room for manoeuvre do national differences in food culture and political strategies create for local authorities responsible for the procurement of school meals?
• What are the constraints on the creation of a sustainable school meals system, and how do local authorities overcome them?
• What is the nature of producer-caterer-consumer relationships in the case study areas?
• To what extent are local producers and consumers (i.e. children) encouraged to participate in the school meals system?
Outputs
For a full list of outputs from this project, please click here
Two types of user engagement were planned for this research. Three practitioner committees were heavily involved in generating research findings concerning food production, consumption and public procurement and involved an ESRC sponsored seminar series.
Findings have been communicated to non-academic users through three high level policy and practice dissemination events held in Cardiff, three UK workshops aimed at local authorities and parent-teacher associations in England, Scotland and Wales, and a BBC sponsored dissemination event.
Books
The book 'The School Food Revolution' has been published which integrates theoretical considerations and empirical evidence about the prospects for sustainable systems of food procurement
Publisher: Earthscan Ltd (30 April 2010)
ISBN-10: 9781849710862
ISBN-13: 978-1849710862
You can purchase this book by clicking here
Partners and Funding
The research is funded by the ESRC through its research grants scheme.
