Lunch, Lost

New Zealand’s national school lunch programme, Ka Ora, Ka Ako, had been operating successfully since 2020, reaching nearly 220,000 students in 2023 with nutritious meals funded through government support. In mid‑2024, the programme was revised to save costs; reducing per‑meal expenditure from around NZD 8.60 down to NZD 3 and claiming NZD 130 million in annual savings. That reduction came with a move toward bulk purchasing and simpler menu offerings across schools.

However, the rollout of this new delivery model revealed critical weaknesses in contract performance oversight. Libelle Group, one of the three main contractors under the School Lunch Collective, was responsible for delivering about 125,000 meals daily when it collapsed into liquidation in March 2025. Before its collapse, the number of affected schools had already shrunk from over 196 to just 79 by late 2024, signalling early delivery failure that went uncorrected.

Quality breakdowns emerged early in the 2025 school year. Dozens of schools - including Auckland Girls' Grammar, Henderson Intermediate, and Massey Primary - reported late or missed deliveries, undercooked meals, nutritional shortfalls, incorrectly labelled dietary food items (e.g., halal meals containing ham), and food wastage, including melted plastic packaging in meals. Several schools had to pay for replacement meals to feed students.

Despite those early failings, there was no structured contract performance monitoring, no school-level dashboards, no delivery scorecards, and no automated alerts tied to milestones or quality standards. The collapse of Libelle left hundreds of schools scrambling, as local and iwi-led suppliers, who might have been engaged earlier were under-utilised due to rigid contract frameworks.

When Libelle went under, liquidators appointed by Deloitte confirmed the company owed more than NZD 14.3 million to nearly 250 creditors, underlining the scale of failure in its financial and operational delivery capability. Compass Group NZ, another collective member, was forced to step in immediately to ensure ongoing meal provision under an operational agreement with liquidators.

This collapse underscores a critical lesson: even socially motivated procurement must be paired with robust contract governance and real-time delivery oversight. The absence of continual performance tracking meant that delivery failures, such as quality issues and supplier instability, weren’t surfaced until it was too late.

What could have prevented failure:

• Daily or weekly delivery monitoring, paired to quality and nutrition standards.

• School-level feedback systems informing contract teams of variance in service.

• Automated alerts for late or failed delivery, dietary compliance, and meal count discrepancies.

• Performance-linked contract terms, enabling rapid supplier change-out when risks became visible.

With such systems in place, institutions like the Ministry of Education may have intervened early - reallocating contracts, engaging backup providers, or escalating issues to protect delivery integrity.

This case is a powerful illustration: contract performance monitoring isn’t optional, even for programmes aimed at social equity. It is the underpinning infrastructure that transforms procurement into delivery assurance.

Libelle Liquidation & Programme Collapse
1News. School lunch provider Libelle Group in liquidation.
www.1news.co.nz/2025/03/11/school-lunch-provider-libelle-group-in-liquidation

Delayed Monitoring: Daily Visual Evidence Mandate
RNZ. School lunch failures: Provider told to show daily visual evidence of quality.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/top/544363/school-lunch-failures-provider-told-to-show-daily-visual-evidence-of-quality 

Creditor Debts Post-Collapse
NZ Herald. School lunch provider Libelle Group owes creditors more than $14.3m.
www.nzherald.co.nz/business/school-lunch-provider-libelle-group-owes-creditors-more-than-143m/YFQOYNZIJBCKJJCRAZRIUDJHSM

Transition to Backup Suppliers
NZ Herald. Libelle Group liquidation sparks calls for school lunch reforms and local solutions.
www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/libelle-group-liquidation-sparks-calls-for-school-lunch-reforms-and-local-solutions/LHWAWP27EBCCFJD2VHK36LMN6A