“We have been offering two vegetarian menus since January, without fish or meat, and it works very well,” explains Nicolas Bonnet (EELV), deputy in charge of catering at Clermont-Ferrand town hall.
In the schools of the Puy-de-Dôme prefecture, we are far from the controversies aroused in Lyon (Rhône).
The ecologist town hall intended to serve to impose a “single menu without meat” in school canteens to facilitate the passage of students due to the health crisis.
A national debate followed until the top of the State, with the Minister of Agriculture who urged the ecologists not to put "ideology on the plate of our children" before seizing the prefect… A “prehistoric debate” from which the Minister for the Ecological Transition Barbara Pompili dissociated herself.
In Clermont-Ferrand, the decision was taken "well before" the Lyon episode, said the entourage of the mayor PS Olivier Bianchi.
"If the City has chosen to go beyond its legal obligations - which now impose only one weekly vegetarian meal - it is because the reduction in the consumption of meat and fish has many virtues ”, underlines the town hall in a press release.
And unlike in Lyon, meat is not excluded from the meal trays on other days.
In the name of children's health and taste
The staff of the Clermont-Ferrand canteens “have been trained in vegetarian cuisine, to explore new ways of decorating and composing the dishes, because it is not only a question of eliminating the ham on the days when there is mash. - ham ”, he added, specifying that eggs, cream or butter were served normally.
On the menu Tuesday: half-egg salad, vegetarian paella, Cantal and apple.
The 33 Clermont canteens offer a unique menu, while providing an alternative for pork-based dishes.
This is "to reduce the environmental impact of meat consumption, but also to limit the impact on health of excessive consumption, a source of diabetes or obesity," said Nicolas Bonnet, also highlighting before “the taste education of children” who discover new dishes.
The savings generated by this new organization will be reinvested to buy products "of better quality", while favoring the local: "We are working to favor local farmers in the face of intensive breeding and often poor quality imports.
Those who do quality have everything to gain, ”assures the deputy.
The FDSEA skeptical
“I'm waiting to see how these savings will be reused, but imposing a menu bothers me a lot.
I do not understand that we do not leave the choice to children and parents who do not necessarily share these ideas ”, reacted Sabine Tholoniat, president of the Departmental Federation of Farmers' Unions (FDSEA) of Puy-de-Dôme .
The union official also wondered "on the exact origin of vegetable proteins, nothing proves that they have not circled the earth twice!"
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Clermont-Ferrand town hall delivers 6,000 meals a day.
Its “food” budget amounts to 1.9 million euros.