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The health and nutrition of our youngest generation should not be left to chance.

1. The Department for Children, Schools and Families takes full responsibility for:

• Implementing Caroline Walker Trust nutrient-based standards in all nurseries
• Improving the regulation of food in nurseries
• Staff training
• Performance measurement
• Financial assistance

2. The Food for Life standards, used throughout England, should be adopted as basic criteria for nursery school food provision.

The Food for Life standards represent the gold standard in food provision in schools, building on the Caroline Walker Trust nutrient-based standards, and to that adding the following criteria:

• Minimum 75 per cent of meals to be made from unprocessed
• food/ingredients
• Minimum 50 per cent of food to be locally sourced
• Minimum 30 per cent of food to come from certified organic ingredients
• Environmental sustainability of food provision
• Appropriate food education

While the Food for Life targets are the best examples of their kind in primary and secondary schools, younger children, who are more vulnerable, deserve such high standards as a minimum in their food provision. If these standards can work for older children, then the younger and more vulnerable children deserve nothing less.

This is the first ever report that looks in detail at the quality of food fed to young children attending nurseries in the UK. Over 600,000 children in England and Wales go to nursery for up to 10 hours a day. In many cases, nurseries are providing the majority of their daily food during the working week.

The report details how there are no clear nutritional standards in place, particularly for the 9 out of 10 nurseries that are not state-maintained.