Parents' Attitudes to Introduction of Organic Food in School Catering

Abstract

Organic food can be understood as a platform for long-term sustainable development, as well as a tool to enhance quality of human alimentation and life. School is an ideal environment to learn good dieting habits. Organic food is often a common part of school catering in foreign countries. This issue is currently widely discussed topic in the Czech Republic. Following the end of the Bioschools (Bioškoly) project of the Ministry of Agriculture, no significant increase in the use of organic food in schools has been observed. The question is whether the problem is on the side of the canteens or the parents. The main aim of this paper is to evaluate the approach of parents towards organic food in school canteens in primary and nursery schools in Prague, capital city of Czech Republic. The key method used was a questionnaire survey in year 2013 with 1500 questionnaires distributed to the parents. Based on the survey results three hypotheses were laid down and statistically tested. The research was conducted under the CZU PEF IGA 20131014 project.