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Chapter Six Generalisation of Results to Other Local Authorities in Scotland
Background and Method
6.1 It is important to understand whether the approach to School Meal procurement used by East Ayrshire Council in the pilots can be applied to other Scottish Local Authorities. If so, what would be the strength and weaknesses of this approach and what would be the barriers to implementation?
6.2 ADAS conducted desk research, including telephone enquiries to local authorities where necessary, to collect background data on all local authorities in Scotland and to gather details of the appropriate officers to contact for further investigation of procurement of food for school meals.
6.3 This was followed by an email survey of Local Authority Procurement Managers (or their equivalents) in Scotland. 9 of the 32 authorities contacted returned completed questionnaires for the survey.
6.4 All of this information has been analysed in order to draw some key conclusions as to how the findings from this research can be best used by other Scottish Local Authorities.
Desk Research
6.5 The main findings of the desk research are included in Appendix 5 in a series of 4 tables. Each provides figures for East Ayrshire Council alongside those of each other local authority in Scotland.
6.6 The key points to emerge from the data collected at this stage can be summarised as follows:
- As a mixed urban and rural council district, East Ayrshire is a middle-ranking council in terms of the number of schools that it supports. Its total of 63 schools in 2004, including 7 special schools, is however some way below the Scottish average of 84 schools per council.
- The different local authorities in Scotland provide education facilities for vastly differing numbers of pupils. Although this argues against making broad generalisations of lessons learned from one council, most councils, including East Ayrshire, serve a number of pupils between 10,000 and 25,000. This gives at least some confidence that some of the lessons learned from East Ayrshire can be applied on a broadly similar scale in other council areas.
- East Ayrshire accounts for around 18,000 of the 715,000 children at primary, secondary and special schools in Scotland. The totals in other council regions range from 71,000 in Glasgow City to little more than 3,000 in the Orkney and Shetland Islands.
- On a day in January 2005 when a mini-census, or 'snapshot', of school meal data was conducted by the Scottish Executive, 43% of children in Scottish publicly funded schools took a school meal, whether free or paid for.
- East Ayrshire's figure of 41.2% 15 was slightly below average. Other authorities' figures ranged from 30.3% (Scottish Borders) up to the exceptional figure of 81.6 (Shetland Islands).
- The figures across Scotland showed that the rate of taking school meals was highest in remote towns, accessible rural, and remote rural locations (see definition in Appendix 5), and lowest in accessible small towns. East Ayrshire did not differ significantly from this picture, making it a useful council region to use of for a pilot local food scheme such as the initiative currently in place.
- Looking at primary and secondary school only, the Scottish averages for pupils taking a school meal in January 2005 were 47% and 46% respectively.
- The figures varied widely from 28% at Edinburgh's secondary schools up to 91% for secondary schools in the Shetland Islands. Primary school figures varied almost as much.
- East Ayrshire's figures of 44% for both its primary and secondary schools were slightly below average, but again show that lessons learned in East Ayrshire, for example in regard to the appeal of school meals, can be read across reasonably well to most other local authorities.
6.7 This information provided a useful starting point for collection of primary data from the local authorities through the email survey.
Survey Research
General information and cost of ingredients
6.8 The authorities that replied to the email survey included some self-defined as Urban, some as Rural, and some as a mixture of the two.
6.9 Of the 8 fully complete questionnaires returned, the cost of school meals ranged from £1.35 to £2.34 for primary school meals. Further details are provided in Appendix 3, Table 1.
6.10 The cost of ingredients for primary schools ranged from 43p to 90p.
6.11 East Ayrshire's primary schools' overall cost of ingredients, with Hungry For Success, is 59 pence. The corresponding cost at the 11 primary schools in the local food initiative is 71.9 pence, bringing in more local and organic produce.
Existing school food supply
6.12 The predominant model used by the Local Authorities who responded to the survey was the use of one common buying agency ( ABC, the Authorities Buying Consortium) , which purchases commodities from a range of different contracted producers for supply to schools across each whole Authority area.
6.13 A few of the authorities used a mixed model where they may use, for example, a number of bakers or butchers.
School meal procurement drivers and ambition
6.14 All respondents were asked to describe their organisation's ambition in regard to the procurement of food for schools, whether simply providing best value for money or a strategy/ambition to procure more fresh, more local, or more organic food.
6.15 As would be expected the main driver for the respondents was value for money and meeting nutritional standards (Hungry for Success).
6.16 Secondary drivers and ambition included sourcing locally where possible and in one case extended to organic and fair-trade products.
- Some verbatim responses help to illustrate this:
"Drivers are: Health agenda, partnership with NHS Highland, Scot. Exec. H4S, ethos of service, links with Soil Association, sustainability. We use fresh local produce where possible, Fair Trade, and organic produce and ingredients."
"The procurement of food for schools is mostly governed by the aspect of quality & price. We would like & welcome more local procurement, but how do you accommodate EU directives & the like?"
Barriers to local procurement
6.17 The e-mail questionnaire asked respondents to state whether, if their authority followed the same model as East Ayrshire Council's pilot, which in simple terms means local suppliers supplying local schools with fresh unprocessed ingredients, what would they see as the main barriers to implementation in their area?
6.18 Table 2 in Appendix 3 shows the responses of the Local Authorities as to the barriers of local procurement
6.19 The main barriers are cost of ingredients and availability of local suppliers. Another significant barrier is EU procurement rules
Views of East Ayrshire's approach
6.20 All respondents were asked to state how applicable they felt East Ayrshire Council's pilot scheme to be to their organisation and asked what they saw to be the key strengths and weaknesses of this approach.
6.21 The majority of respondents saw merit in the approach. The main issues and barriers were reiterated, and the point made that any benefits would have to outweigh any additional costs.
6.22 The following verbatim comments help to illustrate the views collected:
"We believe it would be applicable, but would require start-up information to run a pilot. Key strengths are the nutritional benefitsof using organic produce, boosting the local economy. Key weakness could be the sourcing of local product and suppliers to meet the volumes required."
"This is a good idea to introduce this type of foods into the school dining hall but it should also be part of the curriculum with classroom teachers buying into this to make it work not only in the consumption of the foods but also in the growing of these products."
"Given our urban setting, not very applicable!"
Best practice
6.23 Respondents were asked to state which aspects of East Ayrshire Council's pilot scheme implementation they would like to know more about, so that they could learn from the experience gathered.
6.24 The three main areas that the Local Authorities would like to know more about the pilot are:
- Financial impact of using local suppliers
- Structuring contracts to encourage local supply
- Nutritional benefits of this approach
6.25 These requests for information match the perceived barriers and need to demonstrate additional benefits of local supply
6.26 Again, some of the verbatim responses received help to illustrate the points made:
"If East Ayrshire uses a central menu planning system, are the suppliers able to supply across the area to service this. If not, how do they cope with central menu planning and a variable supply base?"
"Have they had to increase refrigerated storage space significantly?"
"How do they cope with drops in quality of locally supplied food?"
"Is it more important to be organic, where food may come from far away or local when it may not be organic?"
Summary
6.27 Respondents agree that in principal local procurement is a good thing
6.28 There is a perception that major barriers would hinder local procurement. In particular, these relate to increased costs of local produce, and concerns that councils would not be able to attract local suppliers to bid for contracts.
6.29 There is a need for evidence to show the additional benefits of this approach
6.30 There is a need for evidence to quantify any increase in costs
6.31 There is a need to demonstrate how to structure contracts and encourage local suppliers to bid for contracts
6.32 The conclusions are that other authorities feel that local procurement will increase costs of both ingredients and administration. Other barriers such as EU Procurement rules also hinder local supply.
6.33 The East Ayrshire pilot has shown that ingredient and administration costs have gone up modestly, though they remain within the range that many Local Authorities are already paying. This allays to some extent the fear that increased costs would mean local supply is not viable.
6.34 One reason for the increase in ingredient costs is the purchasing of organic produce. Other councils may wish to purchase conventionally farmed produce.
6.35 One of the major barriers highlighted is finding local suppliers wishing to tender for School Meal contracts. The East Ayrshire pilot has highlighted that finding adequate local competition is a challenge. It must be said that the East Ayrshire approach is not the only model for local procurement. There is no reason why existing suppliers cannot be encouraged to source produce from as many local producers as possible. Procurers can influence the suppliers to source more produce locally. This approach may be more appropriate to the more urban councils.
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