Food vendors in the school foodscape: roles, challenges and opportunities for improving child nutrition.

Background: The school food environment critically shapes child nutrition, yet the role of informal food vendors, individuals selling food on school premises without formal government-issued business licenses, remains understudied in Ghana. Objective: This study explored the dual role of informal food vendors as potential gatekeepers to healthy eating and examined the barriers they face in offering nutritious options. Methods: Six focus group discussions were conducted with 38 purposively selected informal food vendors (37 female, 1 male) across six public basic schools in the Cape Coast Metropolitan Area (three farming and three fishing communities). Data were analyzed thematically using NVivo 12. Results: Vendors demonstrated good knowledge of nutrition and hygiene practices (81.6% had food safety training) but operated under severe constraints: intense price sensitivity among students (meals often purchased for 1-2 Ghana cedis), competition from unauthorized external vendors, lack of infrastructure (shelter, storage, water), and weak policy enforcement. These factors forced vendors to prioritize cheap, calorie-dense foods over nutritious alternatives. Conclusions: Vendors are not inherent barriers to healthy eating but constrained entrepreneurs. Their strong accountability (e.g., "We eat the same food we sell") and willingness to collaborate with schools represent untapped opportunities for intervention. Recommendations: Multi-level strategies including enforced school food policies, vendor subsidies or micro-loans, infrastructure investment, and teacher-vendor partnerships are urgently needed.