Providing organic food for millions of Italian pupils. How do we make it?

Italy has successfully improved the quality of school meals over the last decade. Actors from policy and public administration put emphasis especially on the quality of the used products; they should whenever possible come from controlled and certified production. In this paper the focus is on organic products. This paper analyses three crucial aspects of the procurement of high quality school food: a) strengths and weaknesses of organic supply chains in the perspective of producers and caterers; b) call for tenders being used as a key instrument by municipalities, being in charge of school food procurement, in order to influence the quality of school food; and c) best practice cases of municipal school food systems which combine supply chains on the one hand and municipalities and their activities on the other hand. The preliminary results suggest that an integrated approach is needed for high quality school meals. Various stakeholders should be brought together, to discuss their demands and increase the understanding