Publications and resources

This report highlights the vital role of school meal programmes in tackling global challenges, detailing their impact on nutrition, learning, and rural livelihoods, and their contribution to the SDGs. It also presents scenarios for expanding school feeding in low- and middle-income countries and addresses financial and policy needs to achieve universal access by 2030.

This statement presents new evidence on the design and benefits of school meals programmes, including impacts on growth, enrolment, and learning. The statement also explores the comparative effectiveness of cash transfers and school meals as social safety nets and highlights the cost-benefits of these programmes. It concludes with a call for further research to support national governments in adopting sustainable, planet-friendly school meals policies.

This report presents an analysis of the financial landscape for school meal programmes in light of the learning crisis exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. It discusses the fiscal challenges governments face and explores the role of school feeding programmes in addressing education, poverty, and malnutrition issues. The report includes seven case studies and emphasizes multi-sectoral benefits, fiscal space limitations, and donor funding challenges.

School meal programs are popular, serving 61% of primary students in high-income countries but fewer in less wealthy countries. They contribute to education, health, nutrition, and social protection, with evolving objectives such as focusing on learning, healthy diets, and crisis response. These programs also support smallholder farmers, though this impact is not well-studied. This review highlights strong evidence for school meals but notes gaps in effectiveness and cost clarity, with the School Meals Coalition calling for better evidence in response to COVID-19.

This article proposes a comprehensive value-for-money framework for investments in school systems, highlighting the multisectoral returns—such as improvements in education, health, nutrition, and social protection—that emerge from implementing school-based programmes. It emphasizes the benefits of harmonizing interventions across sectors using schools as a common delivery platform.

There is a significant—and growing—body of evidence that well-designed and effectively delivered school meal programs are a cost-effective and scalable means to build human capital, improve learning outcomes, and improve health and nutrition.

Drawing on existing literature, the most up-to-date data, and case studies from around the world, this report provides the first overview of the extent to which countries are supporting their children and adolescents through school health and nutrition policies and programmes. It encourages efforts to improve, scale up, sustain and monitor the progress of these programmes to address learners’ needs holistically, so that all children and adolescents can learn and thrive.

United Nations Children's Fund (UNESCO); World Food Programme

This paper discusses the importance of intersectoral collaboration between health and education to promote adolescent wellbeing. It presents cases from around the world, showing how health services in schools, such as school meals and vaccinations, can improve student outcomes, while also emphasizing the challenges of funding and implementing these integrated programs.

Gray N J, Desmond N A, Ganapathee D S, Beadle S, Bundy D A. Breaking down silos between health and education to improve adolescent wellbeing. BMJ, 2022.