Mr. Mike Neary:

I thank the Joint Committee on Education and Skills for giving me this opportunity to address it and make a contribution on the topic of tackling obesity and the promotion of healthy eating in schools, particularly in the context of the work we do in Bord Bia in conjunction with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine through the Food Dudes programme. Bord Bia is the agency responsible for promoting the consumption of horticultural produce and the marketing of Irish food and horticultural products. Within its horticulture remit, it manages and oversees implementation of the programme which is led by me in my role as director of horticulture in Bord Bia. While the specific task of tackling obesity is not within the remit of Bord Bia, it is widely accepted that a healthy balanced diet with fruit and vegetables at its core is a key contributor to reducing and minimising obesity levels.

Food Dudes is an evidence-based, incentivised, behaviour changing programme which was developed by Professor Fergus Lowe in Bangor University in Wales and aims to encourage increased consumption of fruit and vegetables by primary schoolchildren by changing attitudes and cultivating a liking for fruit and vegetables. The programme is managed by Bord Bia and receives financial support from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine and the European Union through the school fruit and vegetable scheme. It is based on the three core principles of the three Rs: repeated tasting of raw fruit and vegetables to cultivate a liking for fruit and vegetables; role models, which take the form of cartoon characters or food dudes; and rewards - small prizes which incentivise schoolchildren to take part and eat fruit and vegetables.

In phase 1 of the programme portions of raw fruit and vegetables are provided for primary schoolchildren throughout an intervention period of 16 consecutive school days. The graphic contained in my submission shows the range of produce provided for the children and how we sequence delivery over the 16-day period. Supporting materials, including consumption diaries, a DVD on food dude superheroes, prizes which are depicted in the graphic contained in my submission, certificates and school-room wall charts, are provided to maintain fruit and vegetable consumption in the longer term.

After the initial 16 days of produce delivery, phase 2 of the programme commences and the focus switches to the home, which is very important. This phase can run for a number of weeks. The children bring their own fruit and vegetable portions from home in Food Dudes lunch boxes which are distributed at the end of phase 1.

The Food Dudes boost programme was introduced in 2015. It maintains all of the key elements of the original programme but uses fewer rewards and has a stronger focus on the junior cycle, ensuring the programme can reach more children in a school year. Its operation is detailed in my written submission to the committee.

The Food Dudes programme has been evaluated a number of times. All of the evaluations show that the programme has effectively increased the consumption of fruit and vegetables among its target group and that a sustained pattern of eating more fruit and vegetables has been established among participating children. The most recent evaluation was carried out in 2016 by an expert team from UCD which evaluated the long-term impact of the programme on schools that had participated in the 2010-11 school year. The results showed that the number of senior pupils bringing and consuming fruit and vegetables had remained significantly higher than since before the Food Dudes programme intervention in 2010. An interesting finding that emerged from the evaluation was that consumption rates were high at baseline and had remained high at follow-up after the running of the boost programme when increased portions were brought. This suggests the majority of children ate what was provided in their lunch box, even when additional portions of fruit and vegetables were provided at follow-up. This underpins and highlights the importance of parental influence on children’s eating practices.

As part of the EU development of a single school scheme, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine submitted a six-year strategy to the European Union for the delivery of the Food Dudes programme through the European school scheme. It was introduced from 1 August this year. The strategy includes a period of pilot programme testing in the 2017-18 school year of some new elements and activities that might supplement the core elements of the Food Dudes boost programme in future years such as gardening activity, healthy eating days or weeks, project work related to healthy eating, online activities linked with healthy eating or sport linked activities, which have been mentioned. It is envisaged that the additional aspects will be particularly relevant to senior classes. The prime motivation and criterion for success will remain the increased consumption of fruit and vegetables.