Increase in the price of meals in school canteens: who will foot the bill?

Geoffrey Branger 06:00, June 10, 2022

More than 6 million children eat every day in the canteen, in one of the 60,000 schools in France.

The solutions are therefore multiple.

In Libourne, in Gironde, the city spends, for its 15 schools, more than 500,000 euros per year.

This year, the bill should increase by 10 to 30%.

For the assistant delegate for education, Thierry Marty, there is no question of raising prices at the start of the school year. 

Half of the municipalities will have to increase their prices 

"There is a political choice in fact, which is not to make families bear this price increase. And so, suddenly, we have made the choice to absorb it with the city budget," he explains. he on Europe 1. Not all municipalities have the means to absorb these additional costs.

According to the association of mayors of France, half of the municipalities will have to increase their prices, as in Cabariot, in Charente-Maritime.

In September, meals will increase by 30 cents, or 6 euros more each month.

Conversely, in Bayeux in Calvados, the city has chosen another option: to reduce the cost of meals.

Arnaud Tanquerel is the vice-president of the community of commune delegate for education.

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Contracts with local producers

"We have a central kitchen that allows us to work with local products, products from our garden by the school that we set up a year and a half ago. And then, we also work a lot with the children on food waste. So there are weighings that are done every day on our quantities of waste thrown away. And so we prefer to save money on rations, "he explains at the microphone of Europe 1.  

And the city has also signed year-round contracts with local producers so that it no longer depends so much on the evolution of prices.