Schools as a System to Improve Nutrition – UNSCN Discussion Paper

Given the changing circumstances in the nutrition landscape, there is a need to reassess and reiterate the role of the schools in improving health and nutritional status of children. This discussion paper shows that schools offer a unique opportunity to improve nutrition using a systemic, multi-sectoral approach. Social, health, economic and ethic arguments coalesce in and around schools. Looking at schools as a (food system) to improve nutrition offers insights into what interventions to implement and combine to ensure the best possible nutrition outcomes for children in schools, their families and their communities, both now and in future.

The drafting team also received input from outside the UN family, including from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Global Child Nutrition Foundation, Partnership for Child Development (PDC), World Bank and Catholic Relief Services. Most noteworthy is how the process of developing the paper resulted in moving
the issue from policy to practice.

It is critical to recognize the multiple benefits of school-based food and nutrition intervention, such as school meals. The potential returns on investment in school meals extend far beyond health and nutrition benefits, spanning greater access to education, social protection and rural agricultural development. Numerous studies have documented the contribution of school meals to higher enrolment and attendance. In some environments, school meal programs can play a crucial role in supporting the education of at-risk students, such as girls. These benefits are often among the main reasons countries invest in school meal programs.

Amid shifts in the nutritional landscape, there is a need to reassess and reinforce the role of schools in improving the health and nutritional status of children. This paper asserts that schools offer a unique platform from which to realize multiple benefits for children and their communities, while helping to achieve the SDGs. Furthermore, schools can exert influence beyond the student population, serving as a foundation for the involvement of teachers, parents and other community members. Intervention can catalyze community development, bring about social protection and economic empowerment, influence agricultural production systems to deliver diverse and nutritious foods, promote lifelong healthy-eating habits, and address basic health, hygiene, and sanitation issues that affect wellbeing. By providing a better health and living environment, schools have the potential to not only support education, but also underpin mainstream nutrition activities in communities and advance child development

Achieving human rights through school based food and nutrition interventions

Schools can play an integral role in the promotion of human rights, in particular, the right to adequate food, the right to the highest attainable standard of health, and the right to education. These rights, among others, according to the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), are universal and inalienable, indivisible, interdependent and interrelated. The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which has reached near universal adoption, highlights in Article 24 the importance of the provision of nutritious foods in combating disease and malnutrition.

The Committee on the Rights of the Child, in interpreting and operationalizing Article 24, states in General Comment 15 that, “School feeding is desirable to ensure all pupils have access to a full meal every day, which can also enhance children’s attention for learning and increase school enrolment. The Committee recommends that this be combined with nutrition and health education, including setting up school gardens and training teachers to improve children’s nutrition and healthy eating habits.”

Download the discussion paper: English