I was delighted to tuck in to an award winning school dinner when the Soil Association’s Food for Life Scotland initiative was hosted at the Scottish Parliament. The event was designed to promote the Soil Association’s programme which aims to transform food culture across the country so that the food eaten is good for the consumer, the community and the planet.

School meals have certainly changed since I was at school and it was great to see and taste the fantastic work that the Soil Association is doing in ensuring school meals are of high quality. The issue of school meals has come under scrutiny in recent weeks following the withdrawal of some products due to concerns over horsemeat, so it is heartening to see a positive initiative that shows that it is possible to deliver high quality, local sourced school meals, while still providing best value for the local authority and parents.

Central to this initiative is the Food for Life Catering Mark which is a UK wide food award, encouraging caterers to make step-by-step progress towards using more local, free range, fairtrade and organic ingredients. Currently, Fife Council is one of six local authorities with a Catering Mark award, holding a bronze award for 144 primary schools. Across Scotland over 37,560 Catering Mark meals are served every day.

It is important that parents are able to send their children to school in confidence that the lunch they get is healthy, nutritious and exactly as describe and I’m extremely encouraged that Fife Council have a bronze Catering Mark.  For some children their school meal is the only meal of the day and whilst the Soil Association should be applauded in the work they do the Scottish Government must also take action to rethink how they award school meal contracts to improve quality and traceability.