Underpaid, undervalued, and overworked: The working conditions of cooks in India's school lunch programme

Lana Whittaker

Development Policy Review, 2024, vol. 42, issue 4

Abstract: Motivation School feeding programmes employ more than 4 million people globally and have the potential to contribute to the realization of multiple Sustainable Development Goals, including decent work and reducing inequalities. However, the working conditions and experiences of workers in these programmes have received little attention from academics and policy‐makers alike. Consequently, it is currently unclear what the impacts of the employment generated are and whether this employment reduces or perpetuates inequalities. Purpose This article examines the extent to which school feeding programmes can generate beneficial employment by examining the experiences of cooks in the world's largest school lunch programme, India's Midday Meal Scheme. The article focuses on five key areas: who is employed; their pay; their workload; their access to social protection; and the effects of privatization. Approach and methods To examine these five areas, data from three sources are combined: primary data collected in Rajasthan; state‐level secondary data; and the analysis of national‐level documents. Findings The findings show that national policy creates a system in which cooks in the Midday Meal Scheme are underpaid, undervalued, and overworked. These working conditions are underpinned by a series of assumptions and narratives which are all too common in perceptions of care work: that the work is unskilled, not time consuming, and motivated by altruism. The state's lack of regard for these workers is evident in the growing privatization of the scheme. Policy implications Overall, the findings show that policy on school feeding programmes, including those in India, needs to ensure that those working in the scheme are treated as employees and receive sufficient pay and benefits. Providing decent work in these programmes has the potential to not only reduce poverty and inequalities but also to improve the implementation of school feeding programmes.

Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/dpr.12774

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:devpol:v:42:y:2024:i:4:n:e12774

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0950-6764

Access Statistics for this article

Development Policy Review is currently edited by David Booth

More articles in Development Policy Review from Overseas Development Institute Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().