School meal programs aim to address multiple objectives, most commonly to improve children’s nutrition and health and to meet education goals by facilitating and incentivizing children’s school attendance and learning. In addition to these foundational objectives, school meal programs also have potential to play an important role in food systems transformation. This follows from the aggregate scale of these programs, which reach at least 407.8 million children worldwide and are found in at least 148 countries. It also follows from the programs’ multisectoral nature, with relevance for social protection, education, health and nutrition, agricultural and economic growth, and environmental sustainability. School meal programs touch on each of the key goals of food systems transformation.