Policy absence and school meal provision in Türkiye: a structured narrative review and policy analysis

School meals are increasingly recognized as instruments for supporting child nutrition, educational participation, and social protection. However, limited attention has been given to how the absence of an institutionalized national program can be distinguished from implementation failure, low policy priority, or fragmented provision. This study examines the institutional organization of school food provision in Türkiye.

A structured narrative review was combined with qualitative policy document analysis. Epidemiological studies, national institutional reports, legislative and regulatory documents, international guidelines, and comparative program evidence were reviewed. Policy documents were assessed across five dimensions: legal and institutional commitment, program coverage and entitlement, financing, implementation responsibility and continuity, and monitoring and accountability.

The reviewed evidence indicates that nutritional vulnerability among children and adolescents in Türkiye includes excess body weight, irregular meal patterns, selected micronutrient-related concerns, and socioeconomic conditions that may constrain access to adequate food. The school food system combines household provision, regulated commercial food services, and publicly financed meals for particular eligible groups. Although these arrangements demonstrate that public intervention exists, the document analysis did not identify a comprehensive national program combining clearly defined entitlement, recurrent financing, designated implementation responsibility, continuity, nutritional standards, and integrated monitoring. The Turkish case is therefore characterized by policy absence at the level of institutionalized national program provision, coexisting with regulatory, targeted, and fragmented interventions.

The study does not establish a causal relationship between this institutional configuration and specific nutritional or educational outcomes. It proposes a state-guaranteed, multi-level governance framework combining national financing and standards with decentralized implementation, professional nutritional oversight, participatory monitoring, and independent evaluation. The study contributes an operational framework for analyzing policy absence as an observable institutional condition rather than as the complete absence of public action.