Ministry of Education takes necessary measures for provision of healthy foods in canteens of government schools

The School Canteens Committee at the Ministry of Education and Higher Education has taken necessary measures to ensure the provision of healthy foods in canteens of government schools, said an official.

“The committee made regulations and specifications to provide high-quality healthy food at reasonable prices to students,” said Muhammad Abdullah Al Maraghi, Director of the Health and Safety Department and Chairman of the School Canteens Committee at the Ministry. 

He stressed the importance of activating the role of the school canteen supervisors for the safety of all.

Al Maraghi was speaking in a workshop entitled “Healthy Nutrition and Food Safety in Government School Canteens”.

The workshop targeted nearly 200 supervisors of public school canteens. It was organized by the Ministry of Education and Higher Education in cooperation with the School Canteens Committee (members from the Ministry of Public Health, the Ministry of Municipality, the Qatar Diabetes Association, and the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change).

Hind Ali Al Tamimi, Senior Nutritionist from the Ministry of Public Health, gave a presentation entitled “Healthy Nutrition”. She drew attention to healthy nutrition and its benefits, the importance of breakfast, and the health problems resulting from not eating it. 

Al Tamimi provided a set of tips to encourage children to eat breakfast while providing nutritional guidelines for Qatar. She made several recommendations, the most important of which is to eat a variety of healthy foods and reduce the intake of food that contain high levels of sugar, salt, and fat, and drink a sufficient amount of water.

Al Tamimi said that the students must follow a healthy lifestyle by eating healthy food and doing exercise to prevent obesity and other diseases.

Wafa Khamis Shabeel, Senior Food Safety Specialist at the Ministry of Public Health, in a presentation, spoke about health requirements in the school canteen, the infrastructure and the external environment of the school canteen, the dining hall, the safety of the building’s properties, equipment, supplies, food handlers, cleaning, disinfection, and pest control.

She also touched on the role of the school canteen supervisors, the method of receiving and storing, the method of cold and hot display units for food, the mechanism for collecting retained samples, complaints, and suspicions of food poisoning.

The workshop came within the efforts of the School Canteens Committee and the commitment of the Health and Safety Department at the Ministry of Education and Higher Education to contribute to spreading health awareness and promoting a healthy culture among the school community.