School meals and food systems - : Rethinking the consequences for climate, environment, biodiversity, and food sovereignty. Case Study of LOMA-local Food Approach

LOMA is an abbreviation for ‘LOkal MAd’ in Danish; ‘local food’ in English. It is the name of a school meals program that applies an integrated perspective on student participation in planning, preparing, serving and learning about food (Jones et al., 2022; Ruge et al., 2016).
The background for this planet-friendly initiative was the situation in Denmark with no national school food program. This means that parents are responsible for children’s intake of food during schooldays. However, as parents are not present in schools, this constitutes a difficult task for parents. Studies have shown that many children in Danish schools are often hungry during schooldays. Most families will have to go to the supermarket for food, so the-packed-lunch-from-home is rather food-bought-in-the-supermarket (Ruge & Lennert, 2021). This mechanism facilitates supermarket’s use of ‘the packed lunch’ as a vehicle for marketing of a wide range of sugary, fat and salty commodities, both for school children’s food and for the family.