A plant-based educationist wants to introduce plant-based meals into schools as it would be ‘a big step towards meeting the Council’s climate targets’ and help the next generation ‘learn to eat more healthily and sustainably’.

A former primary school teacher from west Somerset has petitioned the County Council to instate two meat-free days a week in primary schools.

Catherine Cannon, who started the ‘Somerset, Feed Our Future’ campaign said that this move would be ‘a big step towards meeting the Council’s climate targets’. 

Moreover, she added: “School lunches are biased towards meat and nobody needs to eat meat every day.”

Plant-based school meals

The petition states that current legislation requires meat to be served on three days a week, which means two plant-based ‘Planet Friendly’ lunches per week, can be included.

In addition, it urges the council to serve only plant-based food at all future council-run events and “lobby the national government asking them to change School Food Standards to include less meat and more veg.”

“[This] will be a huge step towards meeting our climate targets, will give the school community an opportunity to try new ways of eating and will help the next generation learn to eat more healthily and sustainably,” it reads.

Not a vegan agenda

Cannon added that most parents in the county ‘on the whole’ have been ‘very supportive of this initiative’ although some have expressed their concerns over this becoming a ‘vegan agenda’.

“Some people might be worried this is pushing a vegan agenda but this is not what we’re doing,” Cannon told BBC.

“Currently school lunches are biased towards meat and we’re just trying to bring in a bit of balance.”

‘More eco-friendly’

Acknowledging the important role schools play in establishing healthy eating habits in children as well as ‘supporting the wider climate emergency’, the city council said it would support schools in offering more plant-based food options.

“Over the last few months we’ve been working with a number of organisations that are able to support schools in becoming more eco-friendly,” a council spokesman told BBC.

“We will continue to support schools and caterers in offering more plant-based foods, in line with government’s school food standards.”

You can sign the petition here.

• Read: 73% of vegan pupils ‘teased’ because of their beliefs, survey reveals

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Mohsina Dodhiya

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