Australia launches daily meals for students — ABC News Australia
At Elizabeth Street Primary School in Moe, Victoria, Australia, the charity Eat Up has launched the Spoonfull pilot program. Under it, every student at the school receives a healthy lunch every day. The program aims to tackle child hunger and improve students’ wellbeing, ABC News Australia reports.
Students are offered a range of healthy meals, including hot lunches. During the journalists’ visit, the menu included a chicken and pasta bake, as well as tuna and salad rolls. Volunteers help prepare the lunches.
Kitchen equipment
The program was officially presented in the specially equipped Hearts and Hands teaching kitchen at the school. With Spoonfull’s support, the school upgraded its kitchen and received industrial refrigerators and ovens. In the future, it also hopes to install a dishwasher there.
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Carol O'Reilly, the school staff member responsible for student wellbeing, said she noticed the need for such an initiative while working at the school breakfast club: some children arrived without sandwiches. According to her, students’ wellbeing and learning outcomes improved significantly after the program was introduced. School principal Ian Frost also noted the positive impact of the lunches on children’s nutrition, wellbeing and academic performance.
Food insecurity
According to 2023 data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, approximately 16–22% of Australian children experience food insecurity. Single-parent households and low-income families face the highest risk.
Eat Up has been operating for 15 years and during that time has delivered more than 6 million free school lunches to children facing food insecurity. Last year, the organization delivered more than 1.6 million lunches. Eat Up founder Lyndon Galea said Spoonfull complements the organization’s core on-demand lunch model and can provide schools with more sustainable long-term support. Eat Up hopes to launch similar pilot programs at two more schools.
