During an interview on Radio Wales' Sunday Supplement he made the call to ‘make good food the norm rather than the exception in public sector catering facilities’. He also discussed universal free school meals in Wales, ultra-processed foods and the importance of prevention.
Professor Morgan said: “In the book I understand it and define [good food] as food that is ‘appetising, nutritious, culturally appropriate and sustainably produced’. A simple definition that I think most people could sign up to.
“We have done many things that are very laudable in Wales not least being the first and only UK nation to have implemented universal school meals in all primary schools. No other nation in the UK has done that and Wales has won international plaudits for doing so, but having said that we still need to raise the quality of that food. There’s no good universalising poor quality food.
“We need to improve the skillset in the kitchens, we need to spend more on the food ingredients themselves, what we do know is that good food is possible in school food as it is in hospitals and in prisons. The problem is that it tends to be a minority sport and we need to make good food the norm rather than the exception in public sector catering facilities.
“If we wanted to source entirely local food in school food tomorrow it couldn’t be done not least because our horticulture sector in Wales is so underdeveloped and that’s one of the great opportunities before us now as we are boosting the demand side if you like universal free school meals we need to use that power of purchase the procurement budgets to build up local sources of supply like horticulture.
“We have had a wonderful project in Wales called Welsh Veg into Welsh Schools, which is absolutely the right idea but it needs to be mainstreamed. We are starting from a low base, we know where we need to get to. We need to make meals more cost effective, healthier and more climate friendly. We all know that it is the direction of travel and we need to get there sooner rather than later.”
After twenty years of research, Professor Kevin Morgan from Cardiff University has published a book, ‘Serving the Public: The Good Food Revolution in Schools, Hospitals and Prisons’. It has been written for a more general audience.
The book aims to shed light on the vital role public institutions play by exploring strategies and policies aimed at enhancing food quality in schools, hospitals and other public sector institutions.
“In the short-term universal free school meals could lead to more food waste because if you have schools cooking from scratch and wholesome ingredients for example and then try to feed kids who have been weened on ultra-processed foods there is a cultural miss-match in terms of food taste and culture. Therefore it will take us some time to ween kids off ultra-processed foods and for that we need stronger and tougher food regulations.
“We have got standards and regulations for food in schools [but] they are over ten years-old and what is even worse they are not monitored for implementation so its not enough to have standards. You need to have standards that are monitored with some vigilance to ensure that they are actually implemented. That’s the real challenge for us in Wales.
“Prevention is the biggest challenge throughout the public sector particularly in hospitals. There is no solution to our hospital waiting lists long term and no solution to the epidemic of diet related diseases unless we do something about prevention and move investment from treatment to prevention. Good food is part of that recipe for prevention but the lobbies for prevention are very weak.”