Ms Watson said: "68% is the average take up of free school meals where we have a system that identifies against a near 100% where we have a system that doesn't identify those who have free school meals and those who don't.This is the first place I've seen the Return on Investment (ROI) of a biometric system quantified in terms of the uptake in the use of a social program. If the numbers given are accurate, the implementation of an anonymous system for distributing need-based free school lunches can make the difference in whether 30%* of a school's students are getting the nutrition required to give meaning to a school's academic efforts.
Granted, you can shield children from knowing who receives a free meal without using biometrics. Any number of card configurations could manage that. It turns out, however, that card-based solutions among children end up being very expensive in time and money because of lost and forgotten cards.
*30% - assumes nearly all of a schools population qualifies for a free lunch and that there is still a social stigma even when nearly everyone is in the same situation. If only half of the students qualify, which is not uncommon in the United States, the Welsh numbers suggest that 15% more students will eat with an anonymous system than would eat in its absence.
