Vice Mayor of Mykolaiv defends himself, saying that no city in Ukraine can provide quality food for 100% of schoolchildren

Anatoliy Petrov said that Mykolaiv schools are not ready to feed 100% of children. Photo: NikVesti

Anatoliy Petrov, Deputy Mayor of Mykolaiv for Social and Humanitarian Affairs, said that no city in Ukraine can provide quality food for all schoolchildren.

He said this today, 19 September, during a briefing at the Mykolaiv City Hall on the situation with food in the city's schools, according to a correspondent of NikVesti.

As you know, since the beginning of September, free meals have been organised in schools in Mykolaiv and other frontline regions for pupils in grades 1-11. In Mykolaiv, schoolchildren were fed on 8 September. And almost from the first day, parents have been complaining about the quality of the food their children are given, as well as violations of sanitary standards in the canteens.

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According to the deputy mayor of Mykolaiv, the city was not ready to feed all schoolchildren.

«Any city in Ukraine, including us, is not 100% ready to provide meals for 100% of students. The canteens we have today were built in Soviet times. The State Building Standards have changed, and in principle, all canteens, not only in Mykolaiv, are designed to feed fewer children. Previously, according to the law, primary school children and privileged categories were fed. In Mykolaiv, approximately 7-8,000 children out of 46,000 were fed. Accordingly, the number of seats corresponded to the number of children being fed. Last year we fed almost 8,000 children, and today we feed almost 21,000 children. We have 52 educational institutions in operation today. 23 schools have their own canteens, while the rest use canteen facilities and food delivery. Now children eat for five breaks in a row. Because we can have 150, 200 seats,» said Anatolii Petrov.

He was unable to answer the journalist's question «NikVesti» about how the situation in Mykolaiv differs from other regions where there is no public outcry over school meals.

«I can't even say.... I can't explain why,» said Anatolii Petrov.

The head of the education department, Hanna Lychko, noted that the problem may be in the number of children who study full-time and who should be provided with school meals.

Complaints about food in Mykolaiv schools

Parents complain about the quality of food in Mykolaiv schools, photo: Hanna Shevchenko

Earlier, parents of Mykolaiv schoolchildren expressed dissatisfaction with free meals on social media. According to them, the portions were smaller than normal, the meals were served cold, and the dishes in the school canteens were dirty.

Petro Vasheniak, director of the municipal production enterprise for catering in Mykolaiv educational institutions, said he had personally checked the situation, particularly at school 41, where parents complained about the amount of food on the plate. According to him, the portions were in line with the standards, but in the photo, part of the dish was hidden — for example, a chicken nugget was lying on top of potatoes.

Later, the State Food and Consumer Service of Mykolaiv stated that they had not received any complaints about poor quality food in the city's school canteens.

Meanwhile, the mayor of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Sienkevych, responded to the parents' complaints by saying that a special commission would be set up in the city with representatives of the city council to monitor the situation.

Following the incident, the Main Department of the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection in Mykolaiv Oblast checked the food served to children in 15 schools in the city. Experts analysed photo reports of the meals served to students.

As a reminder, in Mykolaiv, parents of pupils at Mykola Arkas Lyceum, which is temporarily operating on the basis of gymnasium No. 39, complain about problems with food in the canteen. According to them, the children are served portions that were not finished by the students of the gymnasium.

The Mykolaiv Education Department confirmed that maggots were found in the porridge at a school in Mykolaiv in the first days of September.

It is known that in the new school year, all pupils from grades 1 to 11 will be provided with free meals in Mykolaiv schools. The funding for meals will be shared: up to 70% of the costs will be covered by the state, and the rest by the city budget.