학교급식의 운영실태와 개선방안 : 식재료 공급을 중심으로

Abstract

학교급식이 본래 목적과 국가적·사회적으로 요구되는 다양한 기능들을 충족하기 위해서는 우수한 품질의 식재료가 안정적으로 공급될 필요가 있다. 그러나 학교급식이 본격적으로 시행된 기간이 아직 10여년에 불과하여 식재료의 품질 및 비효율적 공급체계와 관련한 다양한 문제점들이 지속적으로 제기되고 있다. 따라서 학교급식에 보다 우수한 품질의 식재료를 안정적으로 공급할 수 있도록 학교급식 식재료 공급체계 개선방안을 마련할 필요가 있다. 이 연구는 학교급식에 우수한 품질의 식재료를 안정적으로 공급할 수 있도록 학교급식 식재료 공급체계 개선방안을 마련하는 것을 목적으로 추진되었다.

The primary purpose of the school meals program is to ensure balanced development of physical and mental health of students and to enhance the eating habit of the nation. Amidst growing socio-economic changes, the role of the school meals program becomes more important on many aspects including building a good eating habit for students, preserving and passing the traditional food culture, promoting the consumption of agricultural produce, controlling food supply and demand, ensuring food security, etc. In order to satisfy the primary purpose of the school meals program and realize the various anticipated functions of the program by the nation and society, it is instrumental to secure a stable supply of high-quality food materials. In this regard, the study focuses on finding ways to improve the school meals program for stable supply of high-quality food materials. Food materials are supplied to schools in the process of vendor selection, contract signing, purchase order and inspection. By supplier type, food material supplying channels are divided into ① private companies, ② the web-based cybermarket (G2B transactions) run by the Korea Agro-Fisheries Trade Corporation, and ③ the local municipalities. The produce supply by local municipalities is further broken down into ① the supply by large local governments and ② the supply by basic unit local governments. The food supply by large and basic unit local governments are managed differently as they reflect their regional characteristics. The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology recommends purchase of food materials through School Meals Support Centers for the purpose of transparency, but in reality, there are not many local governments which have established the School Meals Support Centers. The School Meals Support Centers have their key focus on anti-corruption rather than on food supply efficiency, so that there is a limit to the maximum contract amount. It is also a common practice to execute a monthly contract for each classified food item, giving rise to unnecessary cost for administrative process and lowering the food supply quality. Also the logistical distance is determined by each food materials supply agreement executed between individual schools and suppliers, so that if the purchasing schools are located far away and purchase only a small amount of food materials, relatively high delivery costs would inevitably occur. On top of this, the existing quality criteria applied to school food supplies are not realistic. The food materials supply agreement is normally renewed on a monthly basis, making it difficult to stabilize supply in the form of contract-based farming, etc. The School Meals Act does not contain clauses specifying the School Meals Support Center either, so that there are disputes about the functions of the School Meals Support Center and whether a large municipality, not a basic unit municipality, could be allowed to establish a school meals support center. The fundamental improvement of the current school food supply system could be achieved through ① taking a holistic approach toward the school meals system, ② enhancing supply efficiency, ③ building a stable food supply system, and ④ supplying high-quality food materials. Guided by the basic directions stated above, in terms of practical methodology, the following actions such as ① institutional enhancement, ② the supply system setup, and ③ the development of the supportive measures to improve the school meals supply system need to be taken. First, as an effort to achieve institutional enhancement, the School Meals Support Center needs to be clearly defined in the laws with the clarification on its status and roles. The effort could take a form of law amendment, the enactment of standard ordinances, etc. Flexibility needs to be built into the existing schemes related to food supply contracts for school meals to ensure the long-term and repeated transactions, reinforce the logistical capability of the School Meals Support Centers, and to realign the school meals supply system centered around functions. Currently, the bidding principles and the KRW 20 million cap for private contract amount are applied to the School Meals Support Centers following the "Local Governments Contract Act." However, the related laws should be revised to ensure that the food materials supplied to school meals support centers established in accordance with the ordinances of local governments could be exempted from complying with the "Local Governments Contract Act." Second, the School Meals Support Centers need to be established or expanded as a way of building the food supply system, taking the comprehensive responsibility for the procurement and supply of food materials used by schools within the same district. This could make it easier to simultaneously achieve efficiency and transparency in terms of food materials supply. Besides, the roles and responsibilities among related parties need to be restructured. Schools should take the responsibility for lunch menu, purchase order, management of cooking and food quality, and any roles directly related to school meals. On the other hand, the School Meals Support Centers should manage the logistics in general and perform quality management. The private food material suppliers should be responsible for comprehensive delivery of overall food materials, while the central and local governments and the offices of education should design and support policies concerning food materials for school meals. Furthermore, it is necessary to build a produce supply system in line with the unique characteristics of each region, either urban or rural area. Lastly, as a measure to support the school meals supply system, the creation of a reliable food materials information source will be helpful in expediting the supply of food materials. The information system will provide the necessary information for school nutritionists. Large volume supply and demand could stabilize supply, price and quality of produce, and to this end contract-based cultivation should be facilitated on the supply side, while the group purchase and the introduction of menu recommendation need to be accelerated on the demand side. The School Meals Support Centers need to operate their own logistical centers to enable comprehensive and efficient delivery of food items supplied by different suppliers and strengthen their logistical capability. Considering the rising use of environmentally-friendly agricultural produce, the construction of the eco-friendly logistical centers covering broad areas needs to be pursued to ensure seamless supply of such agricultural products. In order to make sure that School Meals Support Centers make a group purchase for all schools within the same district, there must be standardized criteria for food materials in place, and the extensive training on agriculture and rural areas should be provided to school nutritionists to raise their awareness on the use of high-quality agricultural produces such as local produce and green agricultural products.

Researchers: Yun-Jae Hwang, Seung-Yong Gouk Research period: 2011. 1 - 2011. 11 E-mail address: yjhwang@krei.re.kr