MEDIA RELEASE

16 March 2017

KA PAI KAI COMING TO ROTORUA

Healthy Families Rotorua is looking for partners to trial offering affordable, healthy school lunches in Rotorua.

Registered nutritionist and project lead Jasmin Jackson says the plan is to have the lunches, priced between $2.50 and $5, being prepped and sold in local schools and kura kaupapa Maori within the next few months.

"We're looking for people and organisations to collaborate with. We need schools, kura, early childhood centres and kohanga reo who are keen to trial the food with their students, as well as volunteers, community groups and businesses eager to help develop this positive initiative in our region."

Ms Jackson says Ka Pai Kai was started and is successfully being run in Tokoroa schools as a 'community-led intervention to combat food insecurity in the Waikato region'.

"The Waikato District Health Board researched and developed the model with the Tokoroa community. We are privileged to be able to take their learnings and adapt the model to meet the needs of the Rotorua community," she says.

"We want to make healthy food affordable for families. By drawing on local volunteers and charitable groups to prepare the food, we won't need to add all the mark ups that usually result in healthy food being outside of many families' budgets."

The Ka Pai Kai programme also seeks to build health literacy, encourage healthy school food policies and link local food producers to local people.

For more information email jasminj@tearawawhanauora.org.nz.

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