How Surinamese Students Navigate Food Choices: Cultural Practices and Structural Constraints

Abstract

This thesis explores how Surinamese students aged 16 to 18 navigate and experience food choices within school environments. In a context of rising non-communicable diseases, schools are increasingly viewed as key sites for health promotion. Yet little is known about how students themselves understand and respond to food environments which is shaped by cost, availability, cultural norms, and limited institutional support. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with fourteen students in urban Suriname, a school principal and a Health Educator, this qualitative study examines everyday food practices through the lenses of the Capability Approach, Political Economy, and the Anthropology of Food. Findings reveal that students are aware of what is healthy but often delay healthy choices due to structural constraints and social expectations. Unhealthy food is cheap, accessible, and socially normalized, while healthier alternatives are scarce, expensive, or culturally out of place. Students make pragmatic choices within tight boundaries defined by affordability, what they are used to, and satisfaction. Rather than rejecting health, students postpone it, framing healthy eating as a future concern. Students’ food choices are shaped less by what is considered healthy, and more by what food represents in terms of culture, routine, and social identity. The study contributes to debates on youth food autonomy by highlighting the gap between awareness and actionable freedom. It argues that improving student nutrition requires more than education. It requires structural changes that make healthy options realistic and socially meaningful. The findings call for culturally adapted, youth-informed interventions that bridge the gap between health policy and lived experience.