From April to June 2022, the Ministry of Education ran a public consultation on proposed changes to the promotion and provision of healthy drinks in schools. The proposed changes sought to replace a provision within the National Administration Guidelines (NAGs), which required school boards to promote healthy food and nutrition for all students.
Submissions showed strong support for strengthening these requirements by adding a duty on primary and secondary schools and kura to provide only healthy drinks. However, because of a lack of understanding around the potential barriers and impacts of a healthy drinks duty on secondary schools, Government decided to replace the requirements in regulations with no additional duty on schools to provide only healthy drinks.
The Ministry of Education will gather more evidence on the impact of a healthy drink duty on secondary schools, with the intention of introducing a new duty in all schools at the same time. We will also investigate a potential joint work programme with the Ministry of Health focussed on supporting better food and nutrition. While the Ministry initially committed to reporting back to Ministers by the end of 2023, it has postponed this report-back to the end of 2024, due to unanticipated pressure on the schooling sector.
