Motivations of Public Officials as Drivers of Transition to Sustainable School Food Provisioning: Insights from Avignon, France

A large body of experience and expertise on the implementation of sustainable public school food procurement policies has developed in recent years. However, there has been little investigation of the values and motivations of the public officials implementing the policies. To address this gap, we examine how the city of Avignon (France) took a step toward transition to local fresh food procurement for public schools, under French government calls for sustainable food products in public canteens. Our analysis combines the Multi-Level Perspective (MLP) on sustainable transitions with the Public Service Motivation construct. Unlike other studies addressing the MLP at a macro level, we focus on individual motivations behind public action. We demonstrate that staff motivations have a major impact on how policies supporting transition to local fresh food procurement for public schools are implemented. These public officials' approach to food shows concern for the public interest regardless of financial return. It is not the rational choice (utilitarian or monetary rewards) that primarily drives the implementation of urban food policies, but normative conformity (equity, education, fairness) and affective bonding (health, environmental convictions). Interestingly, we conclude that the success of Avignon's politically-driven school food procurement policy is essentially due to the catering and procurement staff who overcame the barriers to its implementation.