We know that a good education is critical to the future of every young person and is their right under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. We also know that it is hard for children and young people to attend school and fully engage in education if they are hungry. School meals programs aim to improve school attendance and performance by providing nutritious meals at school for free.
The current Eat Well Every Day School Lunch scheme being trialled in the Northern suburbs of Adelaide is modelled on a Tasmanian school lunches program and provides hot nutritious lunches to every student attending the trial school.
In response to the trial program, the Acting Commissioner recommends that:
- The Eat Well Every Day School Lunch Scheme is expanded, initially to other schools in the northern suburbs and then to other areas of the State.
- I would like to see this model developed into a sustainable and scalable local model of meal production to be available to all schools initially in the northern suburbs, and then in other areas of the State.
- Recognise children and young people’s experiences of poverty and the multidimensional impacts of poverty on their human rights and everyday lives.
- Introduce a Child Poverty Act which establishes key child poverty reduction measures, indicators and targets.
The Acting Commissioner also encourages the Committee to consider the following reports, which summarise engagement with children and young people about the impact of hunger and poverty:
- Missing Out: Systemic discrimination of children and young people in South Australia (2025)
- Missing voices: Cost of living pressures as described by primary school children (2023)
- Leave No One Behind: What children and young people have said about living in poverty (2019)
- 2030 SDG Action Plan by South Australian Young People (2020)