WHOLE FOODS Market, the ‘healthy grocery store’, has announced it has extended its ‘schools to market’ programme across all nine of its UK stores.
The initiative, developed with School Food Matters, delivers ‘meaningful food education to teachers and school children.’
During the summer and autumn terms, children across the country will visit farms to experience first hand where their food comes from. There will also be a programme of events and activities throughout the season including master class cooking demonstrations, store tours and marketing workshops for pupils.
Nine Whole Foods Market stores are involved in the project, based across London, Cheltenham and Giffnock in Scotland. Each store will work with one secondary and three primary schools locally, taking children on a journey from ‘seed to supermarket’. Pupils will harvest and cook the ingredients for a selection of jams and chutneys that will be available to buy in the Whole Foods Market stores.
This year’s project began in May with the team at Whole Foods launching the programme at a series of school assemblies. In June, Whole Foods Market chefs visit the schools to teach children about the types of ingredients they should look for ahead of their farm visits on the 29th June. Following this, there will be a series of workshops and store tours at Whole Foods Market, leading up to Market Day on 23rd September when children will sell their products to Whole Foods customers.
Benjamin Woodgate, Whole Foods Market Marketing Director/Whole Kids Foundation UK Director said: ‘We wanted to go beyond the ubiquitous farm to fork journey, and so in partnership with the team at School Food Matters, we were able to devise a hands on learning experience from seed to supermarket shelf.
‘We have inspired hundreds of local children and taught them how to get growing, cooking, tasting, marketing, merchandising and selling. This programme is assisting children in developing life skills around entrepreneurialism and employability whilst leaving plenty of opportunity to link it back to the curriculum. Put simply, we are helping to grow healthy kids.’
