Prince Charles urges schools and hospitals to buy local produce

02 December 2008 by
Prince Charles urges schools and hospitals to buy local produce

The Prince of Wales last night urged schools and hospitals to group together to buy locally sourced food from hubs of local farmers.

Speaking at a gathering of school caterers at the inaugural Food for Life Partnership Awards ceremony in London, he said: "This would massively reduce transport costs and food miles, while contributing greatly to local economies and to patient and pupil health. In other words, it would be possible to create a genuinely virtuous circle."

Prince Charles said that, while real damage had been done to the nation's health by the over-reliance on packaged and processed food, there are signs of real optimism in the school meals service.

"Things are beginning to change, not least as a result of the heroic efforts of a really remarkable man, Jamie Oliver," he said. "And at the heart of the progress which has been made is the work of the Food for Life Partnership."

Led by the Soil Association, the Food for Life Partnership is a network of 500 schools across England aiming to transform their food culture, with a further 50 joining every month. Funded by a £16m grant from the Big Lottery Fund, the Partnership is supported by the Focus on Food Campaign, Garden Organic and the Health Education Trust.

However, Prince Charles stressed that it is not enough just to offer healthy food. "The take-up of school meals rises when school meal changes are supported by practical food education like learning to cook, growing food and visiting farms to learn where food actually comes from," he said.

School meals system close to collapse>>

Contract caterers back Jamie Oliver on schools funding>>

Prince Charles slams the Big Mac>>

By Janet Harmer

E-mail your comments to Chris Druce here.

Caterersearch.com jobs
Looking for a new job? Find your next restaurant job here with Caterersearch.com jobs

The Caterer Blog](http://www.caterersearch.com/blogs/catering-news-blog/) Catch up with more news and gossip on the Caterer Blog here
[Newsletters For the latest hospitality news, sign up for our e-mail newsletters.
The Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email

Start the working day with The Caterer’s free breakfast briefing email

Sign Up and manage your preferences below

Check mark icon
Thank you

You have successfully signed up for the Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email and will hear from us soon!

Jacobs Media is honoured to be the recipient of the 2020 Queen's Award for Enterprise.

The highest official awards for UK businesses since being established by royal warrant in 1965. Read more.

close

Ad Blocker detected

We have noticed you are using an adblocker and – although we support freedom of choice – we would like to ask you to enable ads on our site. They are an important revenue source which supports free access of our website's content, especially during the COVID-19 crisis.

trade tracker pixel tracking