AN initiative to provide primary school children with either a free or subsidised hot main meal has been an “extremely successful project”, the Education Minister has said as the scheme begins its roll-out out across all primary schools in Jersey.
Speaking in the States Assembly yesterday, Deputy Catherine Curtis said that the project had “delivered thousands of nutritious hot meals every day” to pupils across the Island since its inception more than seven years ago.
Her comments came as she defended the government’s decision to award the contract for the imminent expansion of the scheme to UK-based food producer firm Apetito.
“Bids were assessed against published criteria including nutrition, quality, social value, deliverability, resilience and value for money”, she said, answering a question from fellow Reform Jersey and St Helier Central Deputy Lee Carpenter.
“The assessment was not based on whether suppliers were local or off-Island, but on which proposal offered the strongest possible solution for Jersey’s children, families and schools.”
St Helier South Deputy Samantha Gleave put to the Education Minister that Caring Cooks of Jersey had also tabled a bid for the contract.
Deputy Gleave stated that the Jersey company’s package had included “fresh food being cooked from scratch” as opposed to “microwave meals being brought in from the UK”.
Deputy Curtis countered that the Apetito meals “are not simply microwaved” but “highly nutritional” and recognised as the “best option” by Public Health.
“I’d be happy to work with other ministers and aim to source more local produce,” she later added. “But I think the main point to keep in mind is that this has been an extremely successful project.
“It’s now delivered thousands of nutritious hot meals every day to children, some who receive them as free meals, and other families pay £2.50 for a hot main meal and a dessert.
“So, from the start in 2019 – which was in four schools – and now the roll-out across all primary schools, it has been an extremely successful project.”
The minister was also quizzed on whether a pilot scheme to introduce free fruit to children in selected primary schools would be expanded to other schools in Jersey.
She told St Saviour Deputy Louise Doublet, who asked the question, that the initiative – which ran from 2023 to 2025 – was “well received” by parents but had “resulted in only a modest increase in fruit consumption”.
The Chamber heard that “rather than expanding the pilot”, fruit has been incorporated into the primary school meal programme, thereby “providing all children in government primary schools with equitable access to fruit”.
St Helier Constable Inna Gardiner pressed the minister on whether she would consider sourcing the fruit from local growers.
“The fruit is sourced from a local provider,” Deputy Curtis said. “I will look into this more to see if the local provider can source more locally grown fruit.
“It’s not a big thing in Jersey at the moment I don’t think, but the aim will be to see if we can get more locally grown food in there.”
