• increasing provision of vegetables and sustainable fish in food offered in early childhood education and care (ECEC) and adjusting intake of meat and milk to reasonable levels to meet recommendations
• advancing food education, reducing food waste and assessing the climate and financial impacts of the shift towards a more plant-based diet

Food supply and food education continue as usual.

The investigators create a sustainable food system model that reduces the climate impact of the food system in early childhood education and care. In practice, the investigators i) promote plant-rich recipes, sustainable food purchases and consumption through municipality food services, ii) renew food education, and iii) reduce food waste in early education and care. To ensure the feasibility and long-term commitment, the investigators bring together municipal stakeholders and key actors within the food system and education sectors to co-create the content of a sustainable food system intervention. The randomized controlled intervention will be carried out at 26 daycare centers within four municipalities in Finland. The impact of the changes at a food system level on children's dietary intake and nutritional status, costs of the whole food system, the climate impact of the menus and children's diets as well as food waste in the daycare centers will be examined.

The investigators assess the change in vegetable, red meat and milk supply at daycare measured with Food Frequency Questionnaire.

The investigators assess the change in carbon footprint of daycare food supply.

The investigators assess how the costs change at food services due to the food system intervention and how cost-effective is the food system intervention compared to the food system as usual.

Data comes from accounting of food services and book keeping: time spent to different tasks in food services.