Food environments in early childhood education : A descriptive analysis of food and nutrition policy, food provision and mealtime practices in private and public childcare in the greater Oslo region, Norway

Abstract

Background: The pre-school years are a time for exponential growth and development and a critical time for establishing dietary behaviours that set children on a path to lifelong health and wellbeing. The intention for “Tid for mat” was to evaluate the food environment of ECE services for 3–4-year-olds in the Oslo and Akershus districts of Norway. Methods: A cross-sectional online survey of service level food and nutrition policy, food provision, and mealtime practices and a comparison of the findings by service type (public and privately run services). Descriptive statistics and tests for differences using chi2 and ANOVA were used to analyse the results. The Wellness Child Care Assessment Tool was used in the policy analysis. Results: 154 service managers or head teachers completed the survey, of these, 50 provided a policy document with 44 analysed. Overall, the strength and comprehensiveness scores were low (mean score 10.2/80 and 10.4/80), with often weak and generalised language. Most policies mentioned food and vegetable provision and the importance of the mealtime environment. Few policies referred to staff familiarity with the national guidelines. Differences were found between the two ECE types, private ECE were more likely to provide meals, have an on-site cook (87% of all services with a cook were private), and sit and eat the same food as children (84% of all services who answered that they “always” or “often” sit and eat the same as the children, were private services). Mealtime practices were similar between the ECE types, encouraging water intake, allowing enough time for children to eat, and including food-related pedagogical activities regularly into their practice. The most common barrier to providing healthy foods and facilitating a healthy food environment was a lack of time, a higher proportion of public ECE reported this; More barriers to providing healthy food and promoting healthy food and practices were experienced by public ECE, lack of support, insufficient funds. While more private ECE experienced “no barriers” in the provision of healthy foods and food environment. Conclusion: This study investigated the food environment of Norwegian ECE, it revealed low scores for both strength and comprehensiveness for service level policy. Some significant differences between the two ECE types regarding food provision were found (i.e., more private provide fruit and vegetables and have on-site cooks) and barriers to providing adequate nutrition and health promoting environment. (i.e., more public ECE experience a lack of support and insufficient funds). The differences between the two types of ECE found in this study, warrant more examination of food provisions, mealtime behaviours, and an overall financial audit. Future work could also focus on the development of support mechanisms for the sector in developing and implementing effective service level policy to provide adequate nutrition that helps children develop eating habits that enable them to grow and develop to their full potential.