FoodStep - a Sustainable Model for Food Services and Early Childhood Education and Care

Not Applicable

Active, not recruiting

• Conditions: Healthy
• Interventions: Other: FoodStep - a sustainable health-promoting model for food services and early childhood education and care

• Registration Number: NCT05249946
• Lead Sponsor: Suvi Virtanen

Brief Summary

Transformation towards a more climate-friendly and healthy sustainable diet will require major changes in the food system: increase in consumption of plant-based foods and only moderate consumption of animal-based foods. In the FoodStep -project, the investigators will develop a sustainable model for food system that reduces the climate impacts of the food system in early childhood education and care. The impact of the changes on children's nutrition, the climate impact of the diet, and the cost of food services will be assessed in a randomised controlled trial. In addition, the effects of the model on the knowledge and attitudes of decision-makers, experts in food service and early childhood education, and families are studied. Based on the project, the model can be applied nationally as part of Finland's climate change mitigation and adaptation strategy. Study aim to a sustainable food system reform through concrete guidelines, communication, and action initiatives.

Detailed Description

Not available

Study Timeline

• Study Start: 2021-11-29
• Study First Submitted: 2021-11-29
• Study First Submitted QC: 2022-02-21
• Study First Posted: 2022-02-22
• Status Verified: 2023-09
• Last Update Submitted: 2023-09-14
• Last Update Posted: 2023-09-15
• Primary Completion: 2024-11
• Study Completion: 2024-11

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: ACTIVE_NOT_RECRUITING
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 116

Inclusion Criteria

• Are attending a full time daycare

Exclusion Criteria

Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: PARALLEL

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Intervention group	FoodStep - a sustainable health-promoting model for food services and early childhood education and care	* 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

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Change in daycare diet of the children	Before the intervention and 1 year after the intervention	The investigators assess the change in vegetable, red meat and milk supply at daycare measured with Food Frequency Questionnaire.
Change in climate impact of Food System model at systemic level	Before the intervention and 1 year after the intervention	The investigators assess the change in carbon footprint of daycare food supply.
Change in food service cost of Food System model at systemic level	Before the intervention and 1 year after the intervention	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.

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

The Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare; 🇫🇮 Helsinki, Finland