Date: 16^th December at 1 p.m. (UTC).

Description: Building on the recent achievements and goals of the Food Systems Summit and on the launch of the Global School Meals Coalition, FAO, WFP and WHO will host a side event in the framework of the Tokyo Nutrition for Growth Summit to present a holistic approach aimed at ensuring that school food for children and adolescents is nutritious, desirable, context-appropriate and more sustainably produced. 

Such an approach, anchored on the rights to food and health and (food) systems-based, considers a wide range of aspects to devise feasible, context-specific and evidence-informed nutrition standards that are also coherent and complementary to other interventions within the school food environment and beyond. When aiming at supporting food system transformation, the process of setting and implementing such standards can promote biodiversity, environmentally friendlier production, preparation and waste practices, more effective food learning, and social justice.

The most recent evidence on the impact of such standards on nutrition outcomes of schoolchildren will be put forward during the event. Furthermore, the speakers will focus on what, how and why the nutrition content of school food and meals, and other complementary measures, have changed and adapted over time in many countries in response to increasing complex and interrelated issues regarding agriculture, nutrition, health, education, emergency and environment. To do so, the event will also feature speakers illustrating their country experiences.

The event will provide participants with the following key takeaways:

• How school nutrition standards need to be adapted to local circumstances and to the priorities of schoolchildren, and ought to be set following an evidence-informed, transparent and food systems-based process.
• Which are the main multilevel challenges in devising, implementing and maintaining such standards (particularly in emergency and fragile contexts), and which lessons to address such challenges have been learned.
• How to engage schoolchildren and adolescents into the process of setting, implementing and monitoring such standards.
• What the most recent evidence says about the outcomes of nutrition standards for school meals.

For registration, click here