Publication: Les Cuisines de la nation: Éduquer, nourrir, industrialiser - Geneviève Zoïa and Laurent Visier

Publication of the book by Geneviève Zoïa and Laurent Visier, Les Cuisines de la nation, Éduquer, nourrir, industrialiser, collection "Le Monde qui vient".

Summary:

In the space of a few decades, schools have been emptied of their kitchens, their cooks, their raw produce and their soil. Production factories, known as "central kitchens", are now responsible for feeding our children.

Like the "green" revolution that is destroying peasant agriculture, on-site kitchens are disappearing in favor of agribusinesses, including a small handful of groups that monopolize collective catering in France. The very act of eating is being discredited, as is the care provided by the "canteen ladies".

What's more, the interests of industry and the state are intertwined on the plate, where certain products become indispensable in the name of national identity - often at the cost of excluding children of migrant origin from poor neighborhoods, who are supposed to be the primary beneficiaries of the school canteen.

Yet the canteen is a precious opportunity to bring farmers into the school, to reconnect with the living world, and to take a better look at things and people. This is the vision held by resistance movements, who advocate the return of on-site cooking, to associate schools with their environment and rebuild the link between peasant producers, cooks and eaters.

A rigorous investigation that sounds the alarm on the industrialization of school canteens.

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