SCHOOL meals in Fife are proving unpopular, a new report has revealed.

Meal sales across primary and secondary schools are falling and catering services are making insufficient revenue with a deficit of £107,695 recorded in the 2018/19 financial year.

In primary schools, parents are choosing increasingly to provide their children with a packed lunch, while high school pupils appear to be opting for snack items and unhealthy food products from external competitors.

Fife Council has made a number of changes to try to promote school meals, including reducing food costs from £1.38 to £1.24 per meal in high schools.

They have also trialled a new computerised payment system to make it easier for kids.

However, uptake still proves to be challenging with only 55.4 per cent of the primary school roll opting for school meals in 2018/19, compared to 62 per cent in 2015/16.

Secondary school meal uptake has plateaued with no change from 33.1 per cent in 2015/16 to the same figure for 2018/19.

Free meal uptake has also dipped in recent years for both primary and secondary kids, down from 80.5 per cent in 2015/16 to 73.5 per cent this year for Primary 1-3 children.

Work is under way to promote free meals and parents can also pre-order with their children.

New menus have been designed and a phone app could be on the way to help secondary pupils get their food quicker.

Meals cost of 72p for primary schools and remain among the lowest-priced in the UK.

Councillor Fay Sinclair, convener of Fife Council's education committee, said: "There are moves to update the national standards. This looks to bring nutritional balance across the week.

"I think it is a delicate balance but children are asking for food we can't give them because of the guidelines.

"As a parent of three, I can say that my children have school meals every day and love it.

"They are younger but I hope as they get older that they've learned to make healthy choices.

"There is a limit to what the council can do to stop high schools kids buying food elsewhere but there have been measures introduced such as the food van, which means pupils can grab something and still leave the grounds.

"I think it's about teaching kids healthy behaviour from an early age so they develop healthy habits later on."

Keith Breasley, service manager, said: "The number of pupils choosing school meals across both primary and secondary has been falling.

"This is due to a number of reasons, including parents preferring to provide packed lunches, and pupils opting for snacks or going to local food outlets nearby.

"However, we're working hard to encourage pupils back. Our main objective is to give pupils a balanced and healthy meal that they want to eat.

"We're looking at using customer feedback to develop quality new menus, in line with the updated Scottish Government's school food regulations.

"We've also introduced software to allow primary pupils to pre-order their food.

"This means that parents can help their child choose a meal that is suitable for them and is something they want to eat.

"For high schools, in addition to our current pre-order system, we're investigating the possibility of developing a phone app.

"This would allow pupils to see what's on the menu at a glance at a time that suits them; order in advance and allow them to just pick their food up without queuing."