Tracing Food Education for Sustainable Development in iPOPY countries. Recommendations for learning about sustainability and organic food within educational contexts.

Summary

Food Education for Sustainable Development (FESD) is evolving into a topical entity included in education in
European countries due to the growing focus on environmental and health problems, which cause a
‘sustainability deficit’ within the food system. This paper presents qualitative and exploratory research results
from iPOPY project, carried out in Denmark, Finland, Italy and Norway regarding FESD and organic food in
public food service for young people. The national core curricula in the studied countries seem to allow FESD
although it is addressed in school contexts in varying ways through different school subjects; to some
extent, the implementation depends on teachers’ other school activities and school food culture. There are
teachers who engage in innovative FESD with students, creating new connections between conceptual,
practical and experiential education by networking with other teachers and food system actors. Results
suggest that pupils and students would achieve more profound learning outcomes if a whole school
approach with integrative and coherent educational strategies would be applied and school food culture
would be considered from the point of view of SD. The school caterers seem not to be too much involved in
FESD but their and their organization’s roles are becoming more important. For successful learning about
sustainability and organic food among young people, teachers, caterers, students and school administration
have to be included in the process.