School Dinners - from the BBC website

[Guest guest]

In Britain there has been much debate about the healthiness - or more

particularly the unhealthiness - of school lunches.

Education Secretary Ruth Kelly is to toughen the minimum nutritional

standards of meals in England.

The BBC News website takes a look at what was on the menu at schools

around the globe.

France

In a country where food is virtually the national religion, school

meals are naturally a subject of intense interest, not least as the

nation worries about the rising obesity rate among its children,

especially the under-15s.

Many schools already employ their own nutritionist, who works with a

parents' committee to ensure lunches provide a healthy, balanced

diet.

Much more is spent per meal than in Britain, with a French school

lunch costing anything from £1.50 to £4 a head, depending on region.

Poorer parents pay only a portion of the total.

And there's no pandering to children's love of pizzas, burgers or

chips; these are adult menus served in child-size portions, as the

French believe good eating habits start early.

On the menu this week in a typical Parisian primary school in the

11th arrondissement is a mouth-watering menu: a starter of

grapefruit, followed by grilled chicken with green beans, then a

cheese course and rice pudding for dessert. The day's snack is a

tangerine.

One day a week, chips are on offer but with a salmon lasagne, rather

than sausage or burgers, while Thursday's pizza is served with a

healthy green salad.

The meal is accompanied by plain water, rather than fizzy drinks.

There is no choice, so children must either eat up or go home for

lunch.

Yet France is still worried by the rapid growth of childhood obesity.

According to the International Obesity Task Force, part of the World

Health Organisation, 36% of Italian children are overweight, compared

with 22% in Britain and a larger-than-expected 19% in France - a

hefty increase for a country that has always prided itself on its

healthy eating habits.

Obesity already affects 15% of French under-15s and, by 2020, the

figure is predicted to rise to 25%, if current trends continue.

As a result, vending machines are not allowed in primary schools and

will be banned in secondary schools from September this year -

meaning an estimated 8,000 will have to be removed from state

schools.

And while French schools may be offering healthy meals, what happens

outside school or even at home is another matter.

The traditional, balanced French meal is now eaten by only 20% of the

population - and McDonalds and other fast-food outlets are as popular

with French children as with their British or American counterparts.

One million people eat at one of the 1,009 McDonald's restaurants in

France every day, and the French now also drink an average of 42

litres, or 74, pints of cola per person each year.

These days, the average French person consumes 34kg of sugar

annually, compared with 23kg just five years ago - while the under-

15s consume most of all, a frightening 39kg per year each, most of it

from snacks, sweets and soft drinks.

A French government commission has made healthy eating such a

priority that primary schools offer nutrition classes, teaching

children the lessons about healthy eating that their parents used to

learn at home.

USA

 

Walk into almost any school cafeteria in the United States and the

students will be grousing about the " mystery meat " and the pile of

green stuff on their plates that once in a former life was spinach.

Students don't like the food, which means as soon as they can drive,

they head off campus to the nearest fast food franchise.

And critics say that school lunches contribute to the fattening of

the United States.

The humble school lunch has had more than its fair share of

controversy in the US.

Attempts to limit the amount of fat by limiting the servings of

French fries have only been met by student rebellion.

And of course, the most controversial moment came when Ronald

Reagan's budget director, David Stockman, proposed classifying

ketchup as a vegetable to meet dietary requirements while also

slashing costs.

Both federal and local officials have been trying to improve the

school lunch programme, so it is more nutritious for students and the

food is more liked by them.

But it's a massive undertaking. The National School Lunch programme

in the United States feeds more than 28 million students in 98,000

schools across the country.

Schools also provide breakfast in some districts to low-income

children and, since 1998, the federal government has also given

schools money to provide snacks to students who participate in after-

school programmes.

In 2003, the US Department of Agriculture said the school lunch

programme cost $7.1bn.

The menus vary greatly from district to district, but they must meet

the applicable recommendations of the Dietary Guidelines Americans.

These say no more than 30% of an individual's calories come from fat,

and less than 10% from saturated fat.

School lunches are also required to provide one-third of the

recommended dietary allowances of protein, Vitamin A, Vitamin C,

iron, calcium, and calories.

The food is mostly packaged, with some critics complaining that

lunchrooms are merely dumping grounds for agricultural surplus.

Dr Walter Willett, head of the department of nutrition at the Harvard

School of Public Health, says of the foods offered to schools by the

Department of Agriculture: " Their foods tend to be at the bottom of

the barrel in terms of healthy nutrition. "

A 2001 Department of Agriculture study showed that 80% of schools

offered menu items that could be combined to meet dietary guidelines.

But more than one-fifth of lunch programmes offered commercial fast

food, and most schools had vending machines. The study found that

students often made bad choices.

But there are attempts at broader reforms.

A new programme partners schools with local small farmers to bring

more fresh fruit and vegetables to students.

And some states are pushing to ban vending machines in an attempt to

keep the students from subsisting on snacks and junk food.

Norway

 

There is no system of school canteens here, and all Norwegian school

children bring a packed lunch to school.

It usually consists of open sandwiches with cheese or salami

toppings. Most schools also offer a cut-price subscription service on

milk, yoghurt or fruit.

Lunch breaks are only 30 minutes long. All the pupils eat their

lunches in the classroom, often while a teacher reads to them from

popular books.

The Norwegian school lunch reflects the general focus on healthy

eating in this country.

Nutrition is part of the national curriculum, and many teachers see

it as their duty to encourage pupils to stay away from unhealthy

foods and drinks which are rich in sugar. It is rare to find soft

drink dispensers in schools here.

But some children do turn up without packed lunches. As there is no

way for them to buy food, they go without for the entire school day.

This has led some to argue schools should introduce a state-run

system of canteens, similar to what is operating in neighbouring

Sweden.

But most agree such canteens should offer only healthy foods, keeping

Norwegian schools free from soft drinks and chips.

Ukraine

 

Chips, pizza or burgers are defiantly not on the menu in Ukraine.

But that doesn't mean that school lunches here are necessarily all

that healthy.

A typical meal has three courses and a fruit drink.

To start, pupils are given an appetiser like borsch, the traditional

Ukrainian soup made out of beetroot, vegetables and meat.

It's followed by a main course of something like sausages or a

cutlet, which is made of chopped meat mixed with egg and breadcrumbs

and then fried.

That's accompanied by mashed potatoes or boiled buckwheat.

The dessert often will be biscuits, pancakes or syrki, which is

chocolate covered cream cheese.

In some Ukrainian schools, children who have special diets are given

healthier meals. They are not served fatty foods.

The ingredients for these special meals are steamed rather than

fried.

This healthy option is something which has been around since Soviet

times.

Virtually all meals are made from fresh ingredients in individual

school kitchens.

Meals used to be free but now most children pay for them, in Kiev a

pupil has to fork out around $2(US) a week.

In Ukraine poverty and corruption are a real problem.

This means that what is served up in school canteens varies across

the country.

According to the authorities in one western region, meals are very

poor quality and pupils are unlikely to be given fish, meat, eggs,

juice, cheese, milk, or butter.

In Kiev, the city mayor pays for all school children to be given

juice and biscuits at break time.