The role of school meals and the different ways they work: How do the meals we see every day work?

School lunches aim to improve people’s nutrition and health, and contribute to efficient resource utilization and social welfare. There are two main types of school lunch programs: direct and contracted, each with their own advantages and disadvantages. In addition, there are various types of meal systems, including traditional, centralized, cooked and stored, and combination meal systems, and each system is applied differently depending on the operation method and goals. Food service management is not just about feeding people, it’s about promoting health and achieving organizational goals.

 

Consider a typical day’s diet. Most people, especially students, probably eat more than one meal a day. Catering is the organizational act of providing meals in an organization, such as a school, hospital, industry, social service facility, or the military, either as part of an ancillary service to achieve its primary purpose or as part of a service to support this purpose. In simple terms, school meals are provided to help students focus on their studies, and hospital meals are provided to help patients recover their health. The development of school lunches in South Korea can be traced back to the rise of working mothers as the country industrialized. As fewer and fewer housewives packed lunches at home, organizations began to provide meals as part of their services, which led to the development of school lunches. So, let’s take a look at how these convenient meals are organized.
The most important thing to consider about school lunches is the meaning and role of school lunches. School lunches aim to improve the nutrition and health of the population. This goal is especially important for school lunches. During childhood and adolescence, physical development occurs rapidly, and poor eating habits can be harmful to health. Therefore, school lunches play an important role in shaping and correcting healthy eating habits. In addition, school lunches can be an efficient and economical use of resources. Basically, school meals are more efficient and economical than preparing food at home because the ingredients are purchased in bulk. Finally, meals contribute to social welfare by being served in child and elderly care facilities. They fulfill the nutritional needs of people who are unable to prepare their own meals, while also bringing them out of isolation and into social spaces.
So, let’s take a closer look at the different types and organizations of cafeterias. There are two main types of cafeteria management: direct and contracted. Direct management is a subsystem of the organization (parent organization) to which the cafeteria belongs, and everything, including facilities, locations, and personnel management, is subject to the parent organization’s regulations and procedures. Outsourcing, on the other hand, is a form of management in which some or all of the cafeteria operations and management tasks are outsourced to a company that specializes in cafeteria management. For example, at Seoul National University, LG Our Home is in charge of the dormitory cafeteria and Samsung Everland is in charge of the 220 dining hall. The advantages of direct management are that it promotes a sense of belonging and prioritizes maintaining quality rather than increasing profits. However, the disadvantages are that it is under the control of a parent company, lacks flexibility, and is expensive to operate. On the other hand, some organizations choose to contract out because they don’t have the funds for facility renovations, or the parent organization doesn’t have the knowledge of food service management. The advantages of outsourcing are that it can reduce food costs and expenses, improve outdated facilities and equipment, and make employee education and training programs more systematic. However, the biggest problem with outsourcing is the fragmented chain of command. In the case of direct catering, the person in charge of catering is usually a dietitian. However, in contracted cafeterias, the dietitian works for the contractor, which can create a dilemma if there is a conflict between the parent organization and the contractor.
Now you know the types of school meal operations. Finally, let’s take a look at how the production, distribution, and service of school meals is organized by system. There are four main types of catering systems. The first is the traditional catering system, in which the production, distribution, and service of food all take place in one continuous location. This is the one we’re familiar with, and it’s usually used in smaller organizations. The second is centralized feeding. This is a group of several geographically adjacent cafeterias that have a central kitchen where food is produced in large quantities and then transported to nearby satellite kitchens in individual servings for distribution and distribution. It’s easy to think of it as a franchise. However, it is not often used in school meals because the time and space of cooking and serving are separated, which can lead to hygiene problems, and there is a risk of not being able to serve meals to groups in case of supply disruptions. The third is the cook-and-store system, where food is prepared in advance, stored, and reheated just before serving. It is characterized by the temporal separation of food production and consumption. The main forms are cook-chill, cook-freeze, and sous-vide. Finally, there is the combination meal system, which involves the purchase of processed and convenience foods in bulk that require little pre-processing, minimizing cooking, and requiring only storage, assembly, heating, and serving. In-flight meals are a combination of both cooked and stored meals.
This is a brief overview of the concepts to give you a better understanding of catering. Food service management is a discipline that combines food nutrition and management. Combining the goals of food nutrition, which are to improve human health and quality of life, with the goals of business administration, which are to effectively achieve corporate objectives, the end goal of food service management is to support the achievement of organizational goals by improving human health. Sometimes, some organizations view catering as just a means to an end. This undermines the original purpose and meaning of catering. Of course, it is inevitable to make a certain amount of profit to cover high rent or labor costs, but it is important to maintain the essence of catering as a long-term welfare investment.