Write-up: 2024 Annual Showcase | September 2024

Between 24-27 September 2024, the Research Consortium for School Health and Nutrition hosted its second Annual Showcase, under the theme: “A New Understanding of School Meals”.

As the Research Consortium’s annual flagship event, the Showcase takes place online each year ahead of the Ministerial Meeting of the School Meals Coalition, with the goal of sharing the key insights emerging from ongoing research into the multisectoral impacts of prioritizing the health and wellbeing of school-age children.

This year’s Showcase brought together leaders from across the Research Consortium’s global academy of 900+ experts from 90+ countries to share how the evidence landscape is rapidly evolving to inform a new understanding of school meals as far more than just a plate of food.

While school meals have a long history of being recognized by governments as an effective way of ensuring the most vulnerable children do not go hungry, new data is now revealing that prioritizing the health and wellbeing of school-age children can have benefits that go far beyond the school canteen – contributing to improved education outcomes, boosting economic development, child wellbeing, gender equity and food systems transformation.

Taking place as four exciting sessions across four days, the 2024 Annual Showcase began with a tour of the evidence landscape, with representatives from across the Consortium’s six Communities of Practice sharing the latest data on what we know about the wide-ranging impacts of investing in the health and wellbeing of school-age children.

On the second day, the conversation turned to the implications of this evidence for policy, exploring the growing recognition of school meals within mainstream guidance for meeting policy objectives across several sectors, including public health, education, agriculture, and social protection.

The third day was an opportunity to hear from the countries who are harnessing the evidence to implement innovative, cost-effective, sustainable school meals programs – including perspectives from the two largest programmes in the world: Brazil and India.

Finally, in the concluding session, the conversation turned to the future, exploring what still must be done if we are to fill the remaining evidence gaps to meet the School Meals Coalition’s mission of ensuring every child can have a healthy meal at school by 2030.

Reflecting on the event, Research Consortium Director Professor Donald Bundy remarked: “Our third Showcase week demonstrated the growing global momentum around school health and nutrition. We were thrilled to see our highest ever turnout of attendees from more than 75 countries, and honoured hear from the world-class experts from across our Global Academy on the wide-reaching benefits of investing in the health and wellbeing of schoolchildren everywhere. It is inspiring to see so many countries committed to transforming school meals into a force for change.”

If you missed any sessions or want to watch them back, you can find all the recordings online.