Cooking Knowledge by the End of Key Stage 3

Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Education – in the Senedd at 2:02 pm on 5 June 2019.

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Photo of Jenny Rathbone Jenny Rathbone Labour 2:02, 5 June 2019

Minister, you and I both had the privilege to see the wonderful facilities at Howardian Primary School, which is one of our new twenty-first century schools, where there was a dedicated cookery teaching area—that was wonderful—as well as some fruit trees and strawberries growing in the playground. Cookery lessons were popular with the pupils I spoke to in year 3, although some of what they were learning to cook wouldn't have been suitable for an evening meal.

But, unfortunately, we know that many school leavers leave without knowing how to cook. In some cases, that's because no cooking goes on in that household—everybody relies on pre-cooked food of one sort or another, which is far too full of sugars, fat and salt. So, how are we going to change the culture through our education system in order to achieve the 'Healthy Weight: Healthy Wales' objectives, which require us to completely rethink our relationship with food?

I wonder whether you can tell us what the uptake of the GCSE in food and nutrition is since it was launched, I believe, three years ago. Higher up the learning curve, I raised yesterday with the environment Minister the uptake of horticulture apprenticeships being as low as 30 so far this year, up to 31 July. The average age of horticulturalists is 55, and the needs of the agriculture industry are huge.

We know from the work being done in Lesley Griffiths's department that there is an upcoming skills shortage of about 6,000 people working in food if we're going to achieve the ambitions we have for this aspect of the foundational economy. So, I wondered whether you could give us some idea how the education system is working to ensure that we have the skills we need for this industry.