Healthy School Food

Charlotte Dumont, / SDGs

Led by the Coalition for Healthy School Food

Coalition-for-healthy-school-food

Thanks to the SDG project we have:

  • Hosted more than ten webinars, knowledge-gathering events, and national stakeholder roundtables with representatives across the charitable sector to discuss the intersection between the SDGs and school food programs. 
  • Included the Sustainable Development Goals diagram in over 50 presentations to federal decision-makers as a tool to talk about the many benefits that can be achieved with well-designed school food programs.
  • Identified and articulated a wide range of policy priorities that speak to different Ministries and mandates, that we refer to in our communications materials and conversations.
    • We have used our School Food Programs and the Sustainable Development Goals diagram in most of our presentations to decision-makers.
    • The SDGs have been useful to point to in demonstrating why school food programs are an issue of federal importance (see slide below). 
    • At a recent members’ meeting one of our members spoke about how they were referring to the links between school food programs and the SDGs in all of their funding proposals thanks to being inspired by this work. 
  • Identified gaps in our communications and available data.
    • One instance of this is that at our November 2023 members planning meeting, members spoke to different priorities to keep in mind when communicating the benefits of school food programs. As an example they identified that it would be valuable to focus more on links with climate change and to do more research in this area.  
  • Used the SDG image to catalyze discussions about the many benefits of school food programs; the SDGs have been an excellent tool to enable stakeholders and decision-makers to think broadly about the wide range of benefits that can be achieved by school food programs.
    • Our members have spoken to how the SDGs provide an excellent tool to use in decision-making and to remember the multiple priorities to consider in any decision relating to school food (e.g. when selecting vendors or planning a kitchen retrofit).