Why children fail to go to the canteen: acceptance of school food.

摘要

Although the discussion in Germany of health promoting school nutrition is relatively new - particularly in comparison with other countries -, it has excited great political and public interest. However, there are many problems linked to school food, one of the most important being the lack of acceptance of school lunches by schoolchildren. As the funds available to local councils are becoming increasingly scarce and because of the high cost pressure, successful provision of school meals is heavily dependent on increasing the degree of utilisation. Therefore, in the present study, ca. 1 000 schoolchildren who never or only rarely ate lunch provided at school were asked about their reasons for not accepting the school meal. The results show that the schoolchildren fail to use the canteen because they expect that the food will have a poor taste, there will be little variety, or because of peer pressure. Participation in the canteen lunch is also prevented by organisational problems, such as the lunch break being too short, as well as external conditions, such as the school form. Schools and the responsible institutions are therefore called on to find adequate solutions to these problems applicable to the normal school day.