Food Industry Information

In the Criteria, Hot foods are assessed per 100g due to the wide variation in serve sizes within this grouping making a per serve criteria inappropriate. The 'Snack food and drinks' categories are assessed 'per serve'. This is appropriate for these categories as many of them are pre-packaged into individual serves and sold in the canteen in this way eg. ice-creams, muffins, drinks etc.

For three of the snack food categories, the criteria is set at 600kJ/serve - this is consistent with the kilojoule content of one 'extra' as defined in the Australian Guide to Healthy Eating. The drinks category is half this number of kilojoules to be consistent with the FSANZ documents.

The cakes and muffins category criteria is set at 900kJ/serve but also has a higher dietary fibre requirement than snack food bars.

Saturated fat for each snack food category is set at 3g/serve. This criteria was derived from a modeling process based on the Australian Dietary Guidelines for Children and Adolescents recommendation that no more than 10% total energy should come from saturated fat.

There are two food categories that do not have a set of criteria; deep fried food and confectionery. Foods that fall into these definitions are regarded as 'Occasional' foods. Deep fried foods are too high in kJ and fat (usually saturated fat). Confectionery are either too high in energy and saturated fat or provide minimal nutritional value.

Sodium has been included as part of the criteria for two reasons:

1. To acknowledge the importance of sodium as part of the Australian Dietary Guidelines.
2. To ensure that the sodium content of foods does not increase as the kilojoule or fat content of products is lowered.

For each food category where sodium is applicable, the criteria have been set at levels that modified products are currently achieving.

Food manufacturers and distributors may wish to consider the following information in order to support school canteens in the implementation of the NSW Healthy School Canteen Strategy:

The Fresh Tastes @ School strategy aims to move the healthier choices to a more favourable position - making them more prominent on school canteen counters, within canteen refrigerators and in vending machines.

Distribution of nutritious foods and drinks is a key factor in meeting the need for reliable, regular access to food products in school canteens across the State. The following are important food access issues for school canteens

• canteens need to have easy, reliable access to foods and drinks. These foods and drinks need to be an appropriate serve size for this marketplace.
• the ease of ordering products is also a major consideration for canteen managers
• the minimal storage space available in most school canteens means that products cannot be purchased in very large quantities, hence the minimal orders required by distributors and the frequency of distribution to schools is an important issue
• ensuring distributors are well informed about the Fresh Tastes strategy is beneficial.

A positive and practical way that food industry can provide support for canteen managers and committees stocking products is in the form of promotional materials. These promotional materials could include

• nutrition information on flyers and other promotional information about products
• designing new menu ideas that meet the nutrient criteria for school canteens
• 'meal deal' ideas that combine different healthy food options
• providing point of sale materials for healthier food products
• providing samples that could be used to conduct taste tests with students is another way of promoting products.