Primary School Meals in Scotland 2021: an opportunity for change

The most recent data from the 2019 Scottish Health Survey indicates that children’s diets in Scotland have not changed or improved over recent years. This together with data from Public Health Scotland [i], which between 2019/20 and 2020/21, highlights a notable and concerning increase in the overall proportion of Primary 1 children who were at risk of overweight or obesity, rising from 23% in 2019/20 to 29.5% in 2021. Furthermore, with more children now eligible for free school meals, due to a £28 million commitment by the Scottish Government and local authorities for children in Primaries 4 and 5 to receive universal free school lunches by August 2021 and January 2022, it is imperative that the provision of these meals is healthy and nutritious if more children are now consuming them.

Our latest report gives an update of the current school meals environment, where the primary school meal menus from the 2021/22 school year have been reviewed, to gauge whether any improvements have been made since 2020.

The COVID-19 pandemic shaped the majority of 2021, with lockdowns and vaccine roll outs influencing the first half of the year [ii]. In February, children in Primaries 1-3 made a full-time return to classrooms, with all pupils returning to school full-time after the Easter holidays. From 9 August, the legal requirement for physical distancing and limits on gatherings were removed.

The 2021 data, collected for this report, indicates that progress continues to be seen within primary school meals since our last report in 2020. However, over the five years since our reporting on school meal standards in Scotland began, improvements have been marginal and there have been recent setbacks in certain areas.

Key findings from the report

Our fourth Primary School Meals report details findings of our analysis of school menus across Scotland (April 2021 to March 2022). In October 2021, we searched the websites of all 32 Scottish local authorities for information on primary school menus. The local authority areas of Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, Orkney Islands and Shetland Islands did not provide menu information on their websites, and so the menus from the remaining 29 local authorities were used in the report.

In this year’s report, we saw some positive developments:

• All local authorities studied in 2021 offered a day without red or processed meat, with an overall reduction in the number of occasions any red or processed meat was offered, from 114 times a week in 2017 to 64 times per week in 2021. This is a 37% reduction since our first report in 2017. Since 2020, there has been a 19% reduction in the provision of red and processed meat. This highlights a continuous effort by local authorities to decrease the amount of red or processed meats which are served throughout the school week.  
• There has also been a reduction in the number of local authorities who offered pizza and chips on their school menus.  
• Alongside this, we explored for the first time how many local authorities were serving meat free hot mains and complete meat free days. 14 local authorities offered complete meat free days (including within cold fillings for sandwiches, wraps, or baked potatoes) 1-2 days per week and 24 local authorities served meat free hot mains once or twice per week. Four local authorities did not offer any meat free hot main courses during the chosen week studied. 

• 28 out of the 29 local authorities included in the report served soup on their menu during the weeks studied, with 13 local authorities serving soup every day of the school week. 
• Furthermore, local authorities were consistent in providing salad on menus every day, with 28 out of 29 local authorities offering salad 5 days a week, which is an improvement from 2020.  
• Healthier pudding options, such as fruit and yoghurt continued to be offered in 2021, with 27 out of 29 local authorities serving this during the weeks studied. This is an increase from both 2020 and 2019. It is encouraging to see the continuing efforts made by local authorities in providing healthier pudding options every day.  
• Finally, there has been a considerable reduction in puddings provided compared with 2020, with no local authorities serving unhealthy puddings every day of the school week. The sugar content of puddings has also shown a decline from 2017 to 2021. 

Despite this, there is still room for improvement in some areas: 

• Our 2021 analysis of red and processed meat highlights a mixed picture. Concerningly, the amount of processed meat in the form of sausages and burgers appears to have increased slightly in 2021.  
• There has also been a decline in the amount of days fish was offered on school menus – a decrease of 22% from our last report in 2020.  
• Alongside this, the provision of oily fish has decreased from 2019, with salmon being the only type of oily fish that was served across different local authorities. These results are disappointing and are a step backwards from the progress made in 2019 where fish was offered more frequently within school meal menus.  
• Despite the decrease in the average weekly sugar content in puddings, there are still too many high-sugar puddings available on school menus (an average of 10 grams in 2021). 

Why healthy school meals matter  

As we emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic, we have been presented with an opportunity to reshape the food environment, as it has changed the value we, as a society, place on food. If Scotland is going to address the growing risk of obesity in school-age children, and the significant adverse impacts of the pandemic on their health and wellbeing, there needs to be a focus on changing school meals to make them healthier. 

School meals provide a unique opportunity to drive the dietary change we need to see in Scotland and act as an exemplar for healthy eating. This opportunity must now be taken to enable a society that values and places access to nutritious food as a priority, whilst also tackling inequality in approaches to improve the food environment, create healthier food systems, and make positive changes to the health, diet and wellbeing of children.  

The current cost of living crisis will undoubtedly further increase demand for free school meals. Also, from January of this year, more children became eligible for free school meals, when provision was extended to all children in Primary 5. Given these circumstances, there has never been a more crucial time to influence children’s diets, through the provision of healthy, nutritious, high quality school meals.  

Our recommendations and Vision for school meals  

We continue to call for improvements around the four recommendations we published in 2017:  

• Use unprocessed or minimally processed foods wherever possible 
• Prioritise vegetables, soup and salads over puddings 
• Reduce free sugar content in school meals towards those of the new Scottish Dietary Goals 
• Create a positive physical and social environment for school meals 

These recommendations help to strengthen our call for primary school meal improvements, together with helping to achieve our vision of positively influencing children’s diet in the school environment. For our vision, as illustrated in the graphic below, to be achieved, the dining experience must be considered so school meals are enjoyed in a positive, safe, vibrant and comfortable environment, where staff are approachable and there is sufficient time to enjoy the lunch on offer. Furthermore, food must be appealing and of high quality, with access to plentiful selection of fruit, vegetables and water, and where menu feedback from children is given importance for school meal delivery moving forwards.

Read our latest report on primary school meals here.

References

[i] Public Health Scotland. (2021). BMI levels increase for Primary 1 School Children during first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Public Health Scotland. Available from: https://publichealthscotland.scot/news/2021/december/bmi-levels-increase-for-primary-1-school-children-during-first-year-of-the-covid-19-pandemic/#:~:text=Data%20released%20today%20by%20Public,years%20to%2029.5%25%20this%20year

[ii] The Scottish Parliament. (2022). Timeline of Coronavirus (COVD-19) in Scotland. SPICe Spotlight. The Scottish Parliament. Available from: https://spice-spotlight.scot/2022/06/24/timeline-of-coronavirus-covid-19-in-scotland/