Healthy eating initiative Eat Them to Defeat Them returns for fifth year
Each school catering team will be provided with ten meal themes from around the world as well as recommended recipes, displays and stickers all of which have been designed to create events to promote uptake of school meals and the vegetables within them.
Dan Parker, chief executive of Veg Power, said: “We are thrilled to be back with our fifth Eat Them To Defeat Them campaign with an exciting new theme.
"Importantly not only are we seeing evidence that our campaign is having a positive impact on children’s vegetable eating habits but the children and schools really enjoy the experience. We are grateful to all the catering teams who have supported us so far, the success of the campaign relies heavily on their involvement.”
The recommended recipes, containing both meat and meat-free options, have been sponsored by Tilda and Quorn Professional. The campaign aims to highlight the children becoming heroes as they defeat the vegetables by eating them.
Annette Coggins, head of foodservice at Tilda UK, added: “It never stops amazing me to see the creativity and passion of school chefs to create the most imaginative meals with a desire to provide children with nutritious and tasty veg-inspired dishes.
“It’s been a fantastic journey so far, with the 2022 campaign reaching over 1 million children and generating over a billion extra children’s portions of vegetable sales – we couldn’t be prouder. We can’t wait to see what 2023 brings.”
This year’s advertising campaign will return to TV screens on Saturday 11th February and the schools’ programme will follow after half-term starting Monday 20th February.
Brett Wainwright, UK business unit controller for foodservice at Quorn Foods, commented: “We’re really excited to be partnering with the Eat Them To Defeat Them campaign which we have admired for many years. Working with like-minded partners that share our vision of providing healthy, nutritious and sustainable food for future generations is so important to us.
“Tackling climate change with great tasting food is at the heart of our mission at Quorn, and we hope that the recipes we have created with Veg Power will inspire and educate children and parents.”
The 2022 campaign directly generated an additional £34.1 million in sales of vegetable nationwide post campaign and 77% of schools participating in the campaign stated their pupils ate more vegetables in school.