School feeding in Germany and Japan: a comparison. Part 2: The Japanese school feeding system.

摘要

This article describes and compares the school feeding programme system in Japan and Germany. Briefly, the Japanese carry out a variety of activities to attempt to enhance the attractiveness of the meals and the pupils' emotional bond to the food. The daily communal meals are a component of the overall teaching concept. There are many special occasions, such as festivals or sporting events, which are systematically linked to the planning of the meals. The pupils are actively involved in serving food and the parents are integrated by sharing meals. There is always a small party at the end of the year at which the pupils thank the kitchen staff for their work. The feeding programme in Japan has a highly developed but very expensive concept for school meals. Germany has hardly started. However, it is not necessary for the Germans to copy the Japanese to achieve a system of high quality. An "uncoupled" system, combining low costs with high quality is suggested. In any case, this would necessitate legally binding instructions and adequate financial support.