In recent years several European countries have adopted measures to encourage the introduction of plant-based options in public collective catering, and in this context Portugal has played a pioneering role. With the approval of Law No. 11 of 2017 it became the first country in the world to make it mandatory to guarantee a vegan option in public canteens.
The Portuguese legislation remains one of the main regulatory reference points on the subject to this day, despite some critical issues that have emerged above all at the implementation level.
Law No. 11/2017
In 2015 the Associação Vegetariana Portuguesa (today ProVeg Portugal) promoted a petition for the introduction of a mandatory plant-based option in public-sector food services, collecting over 15,000 signatures and helping to bring the issue to the attention of the Portuguese Parliament. This initiative set in motion the legislative process that led to the approval, by a large majority, of Law No. 11 of 2017.
The law requires all collective catering services provided by the public sector to guarantee the presence of at least one 100% plant-based option.
Article 2 defines its scope, identifying canteens run by public administrations at state, regional and local level as the facilities subject to the obligation. The provision then lists exhaustively the facilities covered by the rules, namely:
- the public health service;
- care homes and day-care centres;
- primary and secondary schools;
- universities;
- prisons;
- social-care services.
Article 3, in turn, defines the notion of a vegan option, removing any room for free interpretation of the term. It specifies that the required option cannot consist of a simple vegetarian alternative, limited to excluding meat and fish, but must be an entirely plant-based offering — that is, free of any food of animal origin.
The law then addresses the organisational and management aspects of putting the obligation into practice. In particular, it requires menu planning to take place under the supervision of qualified technical staff, with the aim of guaranteeing variety in the foods offered and an adequate nutritional intake so as to ensure a balanced diet. With this in mind, the law requires operational tools and technical documentation (such as nutritional sheets and guidelines) to be drawn up for the proper implementation of the offering. The concrete arrangements for providing the plant-based option remain, in any case, the responsibility of each body managing public canteens.
Finally, the law sets out the system for monitoring the implementation of its provisions, entrusting the supervisory function to the Autoridade de Segurança Alimentar e Económica (ASAE).
The critical aspects of the legislation
Despite the innovative character of Law No. 11/2017, a careful analysis reveals some critical aspects, which can be traced back to two main issues.
Article 3 introduces mechanisms through which the obligation to guarantee a vegan option in public canteens is partly softened. Paragraph 3 provides that, as part of food-waste prevention policies, canteens in primary and secondary schools and in universities may be exempted from the obligation to include the vegan option daily if it is not requested in sufficient numbers by users. Paragraph 4 adds that, where requests are limited, managing bodies may set up a system of advance booking.
This mechanism has proved to be one of the main weak points in the law’s implementation. In some cases the advance-booking provision has been applied so drastically as to require the choice to be communicated extremely far ahead of time, sometimes year by year. Such a practice, while formally compatible with the letter of the law, risks significantly undermining the actual accessibility of the vegan option, turning it from an immediately available alternative within the daily offering into a choice subject to rigid advance planning.
While this approach answers organisational needs and waste-prevention concerns, it also raises issues in terms of genuine equality of access between the different food options. The mechanism further risks entrenching the perception of the vegan option as an exceptional choice compared with the standard offering, rather than fostering its full normalisation within menus. The result is that the obligation introduced by the law is, at least in part, conditioned by a demand-management mechanism that tempers its substantive reach.
A second critical aspect concerns the scope of application of the rules. The exhaustive list of facilities set out in Article 2 does not include food services run by early-childhood facilities, such as nurseries and similar services, which are therefore excluded from the obligation to guarantee a plant-based option.
Resolution No. 92 of 2025
The issue of the exclusion of early-childhood facilities was subsequently addressed through the Resolução da Assembleia da República No. 92/2025, with which the Assembly of the Republic recommended that the Government adopt specific rules on food in nurseries and, more generally, in early-childhood services, both public and private.
The Resolution, which is part of a broader effort to improve the nutritional quality of the food on offer, provides — in addition to the introduction of a nutritionally balanced vegan option suited to children’s dietary needs — for menus to be supervised by qualified professionals and for limits on added sugars, salt and ultra-processed foods.
And in Italy?
Portuguese Law No. 11 of 2017 remains one of the most advanced legislative experiences in Europe on plant-based food in public collective catering.
In Italy the issue is gradually entering the public and institutional debate: a step in this direction is the bill presented in 2026 by MP Eleonora Evi (PD), born in part from the demands promoted by REFOOD through the “Mense Più Green” (Greener Canteens) campaign, with the aim of introducing balanced and sustainable plant-based options in public canteens.
