40 million rural children eat a nutritious meal (mind’s livelihood sight)
In 2011, the General Office of the State Council issued the "Opinions on Implementing the Nutrition Improvement Plan for Rural Compulsory Education Students" and decided to start the implementation of the rural compulsory education student nutrition improvement plan from the fall semester that year.
According to this plan, schools need to provide students with a complete lunch. Schools that are unable to provide lunch can choose to add or break meals.
Food for meals, especially extra meals, should be based on meat, eggs, milk, vegetables, fruits and other foods.
In the past 10 years, how effective has this plan been implemented, and what areas need to be improved?
The reporter conducted an interview.
The dining conditions continue to improve, and the physical fitness of the students has improved significantly
"There are three dishes and one soup at noon every day, so happy!" Having lunch with my friends, Wang Yukang from class 5 (3) of Tangtou Primary School in Sinan County, Guizhou Province was particularly happy during his lunch break every day.
In the past, when the bell rang after school at noon, many children hurried home, put down their dishes and rushed to school. Sometimes family members could not take care of cooking and could only make do with food at the street stall.
Since the school has a nutritious lunch, children no longer have to toss about it.
According to current policies, the central government provides 4 yuan per person per day with a meal allowance for students in the pilot areas of the Nutrition Improvement Program.
"Nutrition improvement plans must do their best, but also do what they can." According to the relevant person in charge of the Education Supervision Bureau of the Ministry of Education, this subsidy standard is mainly based on the annual per capita food consumption expenditure of rural residents, and full amount is used to provide food for students. , The operating expenses of the canteen and the salaries of workers and staff are borne by the local finance.
Taking into account the low price level in rural areas, this arrangement can basically meet the needs of students for meals.
At present, 1762 counties in 29 provinces across the country have implemented nutrition improvement plans, covering 145,700 rural compulsory education schools, accounting for 84.12% of the total number of rural compulsory education schools; 40.6082 million students benefited, accounting for rural compulsory education students 42.4% of the total.
"The school provides three dishes and one soup according to the standard of 4 yuan per person per day. There is meat for every meal, and we don’t resample it for a week." said Wang Long, the principal of Zhuchang Primary School, Qixingguan District, Bijie City, Guizhou. The enterprise specially hires nutritionists to formulate recipes, which are reviewed by the town education management center.
Every once in a while, the school will also combine the children's eating habits, etc., to give feedback to the meal providers and optimize the recipes in time.
In order to make children eat safer and parents more assured, many places have increased investment to improve the dining conditions of rural students.
In Yunnan Yulong Naxi Autonomous County, starting in 2012, the county has purchased fresh-keeping cabinets for schools with lagging canteen conditions and has gradually expanded the school canteen.
According to Yang Xiaoquan, director of the Education and Sports Bureau of Yulong County, currently 92 of the 110 compulsory education schools in the county have achieved canteen feeding, and the remaining 18 schools that do not yet have the conditions for canteen feeding, the company distributes nutritious lunches according to recipes every day .
The period of primary and middle school students is a critical period for children's growth and development, and a balanced diet is an important guarantee for their healthy growth.
Wu Daquan, the principal of Tangtou Primary School in Sinan County, observed that after eating and resting, the children's physique has also changed significantly. There is a school sports meeting in November every year, and the school record of long-distance running in the past two years has been continuously improved.
In May of this year, the "Summary Report on the Implementation of the Nutrition Improvement Plan for Rural Compulsory Education Students" issued by the Education Supervision Bureau of the Ministry of Education (Education Supervision Office of the State Council) showed that the nutritional and health status of students has been significantly improved, and their physical fitness has been significantly improved.
According to the tracking and monitoring data of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2019, the average height of men and girls of each age group in the pilot areas of the Nutrition Improvement Program increased by 1.54 cm and 1.69 cm, respectively, and the average weight increased by 1.06 kg and 1.18 kg respectively, which is higher than the national level. The average growth rate of rural students.
"The nutrition improvement plan strengthens the bottom line of social equity." said Ren Chunrong, a researcher and deputy director of the Institute of Educational Supervision and Evaluation of the Chinese Academy of Educational Sciences. Most rural parents work in agriculture or work outside, and often do not have time to cook lunch for their children. The layout of the school has been adjusted, and the distance between home and school is relatively long. It is inconvenient for students to go home for lunch.
The Nutrition Improvement Program protects children from hunger and malnutrition, and allows parents to devote more time to work to increase family income.
Hold the "red line" of food safety and promote the formation of a full chain supervision mechanism
Since the implementation of the nutrition improvement plan, the central government and departments at all levels have continuously strengthened the construction of the system, continued and steadily invested, and earnestly paid attention to the "two safety" of food and funds to ensure the steady and orderly implementation of the nutrition improvement plan.
From 2011 to 2019, the central government has allocated 147.2 billion yuan in subsidies for nutritious meals.
——Improve the food quality and safety supervision mechanism, firmly establish the "red line" awareness of food safety, and increase the coverage of "bright kitchens and bright stoves" in the canteens of middle and primary schools.
Every year before the beginning of the new semester, Jiuhe Middle School in Yulong County invites parents of students to participate in a meal tasting meeting.
"Let everyone participate in the supervision of the school cafeteria to ensure the quality of the meals." said Yang Shisheng, the principal of Jiuhe Middle School.
In order to ensure the quality of meals, the school has signed a letter of responsibility with the catering companies, requiring the companies to provide milk and eggs that meet the nutritional standards in accordance with the contract.
"The County Nutrition Office has formulated an emergency plan for nutritional meal safety accidents. Each campus has set up special posts to be specifically responsible for the supervision and management of food raw material procurement, tableware disinfection, food storage, and meal sharing. At the same time, it establishes a food sample monitoring system and a ledger management system The sample retention time is not less than 48 hours.” Liu Jianmei, deputy director of Yulong County Education and Sports Bureau, introduced.
In March and September last year, the Gucheng District of Lijiang City, Yunnan Province carried out 2 comprehensive inspections of the canteens of primary and middle schools in the district.
The law enforcement officers of the District Market Supervision and Administration Bureau inspected the raw material procurement ledger, meal sampling records, food circulation permits, health certificates of employees and other relevant materials in the school canteen, and immediately rectified the problems found.
—— Strictly implement the fund management system, keep the "bottom line" of fund safety, and ensure that the national nutrition and diet subsidy "every penny goes to students' mouths".
"The money is used by the state to improve the lives of students. It must be earmarked for special purposes, and every penny must be spent cautiously." Wu Daquan said that the school will settle the cost of ingredients every week and make regular announcements, and the school union will monitor it at any time.
The Sinan County Education Bureau established a nutrition improvement leading group to organize the county development and reform bureau, the city supervision bureau, schools and other units to investigate the market prices of various food ingredients and comprehensively set prices to ensure that the prices are within a reasonable range.
“Nutrition meal funds are managed by the school finance bureau, and the school principal sees the account but does not see the money.” Ge Di, a staff member of the Nutrition Office of the Education and Technology Bureau of Qixingguan District, Bijie City, said that the nutrition improvement plan is supported by national special funds, based on the number of school days and the number of people in school. , Transfer to the District Education Bureau according to the semester, and then directly connect with the bidding company.
Each school reports the number of students according to the facts within the first week of each semester, and at the same time publicly announces the use of nutritious meal funds, the amount of recipes, and the names of students enjoying nutritious meals, and accepts teachers, students, and parents' supervision.
From August to October last year, the Ministry of Education sent personnel to Sichuan, Yunnan and other places to go to grassroots first-line schools and catering companies to investigate and rectify the use and management of local nutrition improvement plan funds.
The relevant person in charge of the Education Supervision Bureau of the Ministry of Education said that through special rectification, the "four unifications" bidding system for grains and oils and other bulk foods and raw and auxiliary materials in various places has been further standardized, and the awareness of fund management risks has been significantly enhanced.
At present, the catering system for school leaders and the information disclosure system have been fully implemented, and the whole process and chain supervision situation has basically taken shape.
Establish and improve the nutritional catering system to ensure that students can eat well
Two years ago, Youxi County, Fujian was included in the provincial nutrition improvement plan for bulk food and raw and auxiliary materials as a pilot county for "unified procurement, centralized distribution, and coordinated supervision".
"In view of the developmental characteristics of primary and middle school students and their different nutritional needs, we invite professional dietitians from the Provincial Dietitian Association to formulate recipes with quantity and price, and deliver fresh ingredients in time every day to ensure balanced nutrition for students." Youxi Lvsheng Trading Company Undertaking the task of procurement and distribution, the company’s person in charge Chen Yizhi introduced that it has been connected with more than 20 planting bases and suppliers in Fuzhou, Xiamen, Youxi and other places, and the food materials have passed the three inspection gates of the market, the supplier, and the green company. After passing the test, it will be sorted and stored in the warehouse.
"Compared with procurement and purchase, recipe matching is a big project. Now the county platform distributes ingredients and matches well with good recipes. The school canteen can focus more on fine management." Youxi No. 5 Middle School Huang Nengtan, manager of the student canteen, said.
At the end of last year, the "Notice on Further Strengthening the Management of the Nutrition Improvement Plan for Rural Compulsory Education Students" (hereinafter referred to as the "Notice") jointly issued by the Ministry of Education, the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments pointed out that since the implementation of the rural compulsory education student nutrition improvement plan In some places, there are still problems such as poorly targeted health education and delayed implementation of nutrition and health monitoring and evaluation, which affects the implementation effect of this plan to a certain extent.
"From the survey, the investment in operating funds and the quality of the workforce are the core to further improve the quality of food." Ren Chunrong said that insufficient operating funds can easily lead to instability of employees and it is difficult to hire high-level chefs and cafeteria staff. Skill training The effect is also not ideal.
In most areas, it is still not possible to formulate and adjust school meal recipes according to local eating habits and seasonal changes. It is still common for canteen administrators and chefs who have a teaching background to determine a week’s recipes. Schools with conditions to be equipped with nutritionists Rarely.
In this regard, the "Notice" specifically proposes to "strengthen nutrition and health education" and "do a good job in nutrition and health monitoring."
On the one hand, local education, health and health administrative departments are required to strengthen nutrition guidance, increase the training of canteen employees, and establish a sound nutrition catering system; at the same time, further strengthen the monitoring and evaluation of student nutrition and health status, and effectively enhance student nutrition improvement work Pertinence and effectiveness.
At present, the objects covered by nutritious meals are mainly divided by region.
Ren Chunrong suggested that, in accordance with my country’s national conditions, further improve the quality of meals, and continue to implement the “4+X” (central fiscal subsidy 4 yuan, students can pay a certain meal fee) meal mode, and also implement differentiated families Subsidy policy.
"With the improvement of the accuracy of poverty alleviation in my country, the implementation of differentiated subsidy models has a certain foundation. The identification of subsidy objects should be changed from the geographical target method to the crowd target method, and priority should be given to increasing the subsidy for students from registered families and teaching students. We will gradually establish a classification and classification subsidy system."
Regarding the standard of meals, the relevant person in charge of the work leadership group of the rural compulsory education student nutrition improvement plan in Jinzhai County of Anhui said frankly that as prices and labor costs continue to rise, coupled with the growth and development of children’s demand for food gradually "Eat well" has changed to "eat well." The original subsidy standard of 4 yuan per person per day has gradually been unable to keep up with demand. It is necessary to appropriately raise it according to the situation.
The relevant person in charge of the Education Supervision Bureau of the Ministry of Education stated that in response to the impact of food price fluctuations on the procurement of raw materials for catering, they are currently actively working with relevant central departments to promote localities to integrate local economic development and price levels, and to further implement the basic standards of national dietary subsidies. Improve the mechanism for the government, families, and social forces to share meal expenses, and explore the establishment of a dynamic adjustment mechanism for meal subsidy standards to ensure that students are fed and eat well.
Our reporter Yu Jingxian, Li Maoying, and Su Bin