Last updated: 10/09/2024
Nutritional education in schools
Allocate £100 million per year to improve nutrition and food preparation literacy in childhood through the state education system
- Very low impact on obesity
A percentage estimate of how much the policy would reduce national obesity rates
- Relative reduction in obesity prevalence: 0%
- Very high evidence quality
A rating of the strength of evidence, accounting for both reliability and validity of the evidence
- Reliability and validity rating: 5/5
- High cost to governments
Cost to UK and devolved governments over 5 years
- Costs to governments over 5 years: £500m
- Benefit to governments per year: £0
What is the policy?
This policy would increase the provision of information to children relating to nutrition, diet-related health and food preparation in primary school settings. This can be classroom-based, but may also be part of a wider whole-school approach through, for example, a school garden project or field trips to nearby farms. This could be standalone interventions (nutrition only) or multi-component interventions, which include nutrition education.
Recent context
In England, nutrition and food education is currently included in the National Curriculum for Design and Technology (D&T), the GCSE Food Preparation and Nutrition, and the Core Competences for Children and Young People aged 5–16 years. It has been monitored by Ofsted since September 2015. Schools can also evaluate themselves against the Department for Education’s (DfE’s) Healthy schools rating scheme, which sets out a number of metrics for assessing school health, including food education.
The Curriculum for Wales, introduced in September 2022, includes nutrition within its Health and Wellbeing Area of Learning and Expertise. This Area aims to help learners understand the factors that affect physical health and wellbeing, including health-promoting behaviours such as a balanced diet, physical activity, personal care and protection from infection. By the end of their pre-16 education, pupils should be able to adjust their diet in response to different contexts and apply a range of techniques to prepare a variety of nutritious meals.
The Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) in Scotland has specific outcomes and experiences related to nutrition and health that young people are expected to have met by different stages of their education. Schools have relative freedom to reach these outcomes in a way that works for their student population’s competency and need. On food and health, young people are expected to have achieved the following by the end of primary school (Second Level in CfE):
- pupils enjoy eating a diversity of foods in a range of social situations
- pupils contribute to a healthy eating plan by applying knowledge and understanding of current healthy eating advice
- having learned about cleanliness, hygiene and safety, pupils understand their importance to health and wellbeing
- pupils are becoming aware of the journeys made by foods from source to consumer, their seasonality, their local availability and their sustainability
- by investigating food labelling systems, pupils can understand how to use them to make healthy food choices.
Case studies
Washingborough Academy, Lincolnshire, UK
Washingborough Academy, a 300 pupil primary school in Lincolnshire, has been highlighted as a centre of best practice in food and nutrition education by the UK Government and the United Nations. Food and nutrition education is integrated across multiple aspects of school life, incorporating practical activities, including food tasting and cooking classes, growing food in the kitchen garden and orchards and using the produce in school meals. Food education is integrated across the whole curriculum and in wider-school life providing the pupils with a holistic understanding of food, its production and local sourcing, as well as health and sustainability.
The youngest children at Washingborough learn about food via a sensory-based food education and tasting programme called TastED. This method was pioneered by the school and tailored to the curriculum. It is now approved by the DfE for teaching young children about food and nutrition. To date, 1,300 schools and nurseries have signed up to use this method and resources.
Considerations for implementation
Standard options for improving nutritional education include, but are not limited to:
- Strengthening curriculum delivery: There may be a benefit from developing interventions that address barriers to delivering the current curriculum and ensure it is both appealing to staff and achievable.
- Teacher training: Teacher training, including developing training programmes, instructional materials, and practical resources for hands-on learning activities related to food preparation and nutrition.
- School infrastructure: Assessing the existing infrastructure in schools, such as kitchens, cooking facilities, and garden spaces, to support practical learning experiences.
- Utilising partnerships and collaborations: Exploring partnerships with organisations, chefs, nutritionists, and local suppliers to enhance the programme’s delivery.
A practical approach may be to focus on schools underperforming on these standards currently. Consideration should be given to the length of time needed for assessing impact, where reduction in BMI may not be observed in the short term.
Estimating the population impact
We estimated that this policy would reduce the prevalence of adult UK obesity rates by approximately 0%
Estimating the per-person impact
A systematic review by Nally et al. (2021) considered the effectiveness of school-based interventions on obesity-related behaviours in primary school children. It found a small but significant reduction in BMI across all interventions, compared to controls. The review also examined school-based nutrition interventions for students aged 5–12 as a standalone intervention, or in combination with interventions to increase physical activity or decrease sedentary behaviour. The effect of nutrition interventions on BMI were not statistically significant.
Based on this data, our modelling estimated the net daily calorie deficit for children to be zero.
Changes in the prevalence of people living with obesity
Analytical modelling found that this policy would have no effect for children over a five-year period. Table 1 shows the percentage reduction of children moving from BMI percentile ≥ 85th percentile into a healthier BMI category following increased funding for nutritional literacy lessons (five-year follow up).
| Adults (England and Wales) | Children (England and Wales) | Adults (Scotland) | Children (Scotland) |
| Not applicable | 0% | Not applicable | 0% |
Estimating the population reach
Not applicable
Cost and benefits
Cost over 5 years
We estimated that this policy would cost the governments approximately £500 million over five years
We commissioned HealthLumen to estimate the cost of the policy to both industry and governments over a five-year period.
Table 2 below shows a breakdown of costs. The direct costs to the governments are estimated at approximately £500 million. The costs to the food industry are not applicable here.
| Group affected | Cost | Horizon | Detail |
| Costs | |||
| Government | £0.5bn | Annual (5 years) | Provision of £100m for local authorities per year to be given to schools |
Total annual benefit
We estimated that this policy would have an annual benefit of approximately £0
Based on our analysis, and using analysis conducted by the Tony Blair Institute and Frontier Economics we estimate this policy would not lead to monetary benefit for the governments.
Impact on disease incidence
Based on our analysis and analysis conducted by HealthLumen, there is no evidence that this policy would impact disease incidence avoided after five years.
Behind the averages: impact on inequalities
There is limited reporting of the effect of this policy on children from different socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds. However, where it is reported, there is no evidence that it would increase inequalities.
Rating the strength of evidence
We asked experts working in the fields of obesity, food, and health research to rate the strength of the evidence base for each policy, taking into account both reliability (size and consistency) and validity (quality and content) of the evidence. Policies were rated on a Likert scale of 1–5 (none, limited, medium, strong, and very strong evidence base). The Blueprint Expert Advisory Group rated this policy as having a Very Strong evidence base.
Ban on all HFSS price promotions in food retail businesses
Ban all price promotions (e.g. was/now prices, introductory prices, temporary price reductions) of HFSS foods in the retail sector excluding small and micro businesses