Meet Finland’s ambassador for school meals. Yes, school meals

When Finnish Ambassador Anu Saarela returned home from her recent tenure in Iraq, she was given a new and unexpected job title: Finland’s Ambassador for School Meals. While it may not sound as glamorous as a head-of-mission posting abroad, it does say a lot about how Finland practices diplomacy.

Saarela is the first to hold the title in Finland and suspects she may be the only career diplomat globally at this level. She cites other thematic ambassadorial home postings — Cyber Ambassador, Circular economy Ambassador, or Hybrid Threats Ambassador — as examples of how Finland turns domestic expertise into global peer-learning opportunities.

“It’s a form of diplomacy that operates not just through geopolitics, but through social policy, education and well-being,” Saarela explains

A long-standing system

The Finns are well positioned to claim authority in school feeding. Finland is widely recognized as the first country to legislate universal free school meals. The law was passed during World War II in response to growing hunger and poverty, and came into effect in 1948. While school meals also existed in parts of the UK, Germany the U.S. and elsewhere, Saarela says they were typically locally-driven by charitable groups or means-tested for “poor children” only.

“In Finland, there was no stigma. Every child—  regardless of background — had a right to a warm meal at school each day. It was embedded in our education system,” she says.

What does an Ambassador for School Meals do?

“Nobody ever told me,” Saarela laughs. “I just went in on day one and thought, okay, where should we start?” Working closely with Ville Pennanen, a desk officer at the Ministry, Saarela’s role involves speaking on expert panels and connecting countries to Finland’s wider network — from the National Agency for Education and health authorities such as the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare to nutrition and agriculture experts.

Demand for Finnish expertise is high. Still, Saarela is careful to stress that Finland does not export a template. “You can’t copy a system. Different countries have different structures,” she says. “What we want to do is inspire, and also to learn.”

What goes on the plate?

A typical lunch for a Finnish schoolchild is deliberately unflashy, following a familiar structure: a hot main, a salad or grated vegetables (the famous raaste), dark bread or crispbread, and milk or piimä, a kind of butter milk. Over time, the meal has also become pedagogical. “It’s more than the food on the plate, it’s part of learning,” Saarela says, tied to lessons around nutrition, home economics, sustainable sourcing and even different food cultures and diets. Regional variation plays a role too. “In Lapland, they eat reindeer with lingonberry sauce,” Saarela says.

Saarela recalls lessons from her own time at school that have stayed with her. “Everyone was expected to bring lingonberries back with them after the summer break. We picked them in the forest; they were preserved, then they became part of our school meals.” In some places, classes even went berry-picking together. This is not the case anymore, but what hasn’t changed is how meals are eaten.

“The whole class eats at the same time, at the same tables,” Pennanen explains. “Younger children often sit with a teacher who supervises the lunch, so no one is left out.” Children are also encouraged to try everything. “At home you don’t necessarily have that variety,” Saarela adds. “At school, you’re exposed to it.” The result is a daily routine that subtly reinforces equality, social skills and good habits.

From Finland to the world

Saarela sees this daily intervention as the widest social protection net globally for children. Its importance became especially clear during the COVID-19 pandemic, when school feeding systems everywhere were suddenly disrupted. This disruption became the catalyst for the School Meals Coalition. Finland and France led the launch of the coalition, which has the World Food Program (WFP) as its secretariat. Brazil is today the third co-chair of the coalition alongside those two countries.

When the coalition started in 2021, there were only around 40 countries signed up. Now there are already 112.  The expansion translates into around 80 million additional children worldwide who now receive a school meal, with an estimated 99 per cent of funding for those meals coming from national governments. “Crucially,” Pennanen says, “the emphasis has shifted from temporary interventions to long-term commitments.” Countries make voluntary commitments like developing national policies, increasing funding or improving nutrition standards.

“This used to be a project. Now it’s a global policy driver,” Pennanen says. “That’s the mantra we hear a lot at global meetings.”

To help turn these commitments into action, the School Meals Accelerator was launched as a next phase of the coalition, designed to support countries ready to scale up nationwide programs more quickly. This first-of-its-kind initiative has the goal of reaching an additional 100 million children by 2030.

From policy to politics

The political commitment is increasingly overt. “Some leaders are even running political campaigns on school lunches,” Saarela says. In Indonesia, school feeding was part of the presidential election campaign, and nationwide reform there now aims to cover around 80 million children. Saarela also cites several post-conflict African countries, including Sierra Leone and Rwanda, where leaders have framed nationwide school feeding as a core element of state rebuilding.

Saarela’s interest in school meals as a stabilising force is shaped by her earlier postings as Finland’s Ambassador to Cyprus, Israel and then Iraq, all places marked by conflict or post-conflict recovery. After years working in regions where insecurity is part of daily life, Saarela has come to value policies that work beyond ideologies.

“School meals,” she says, “are one of those rare interventions that cut across ethnic, religious and political lines, offering something tangible that people across society can all agree on.”