It is considered the perfect food by many nutritionists. It has a popular white moustache campaign, yet milk is less popular now than it was 20, 30 even 40 years ago.

In the 70s there was a school milk programme. Dunkley?s Dairy delivered half pints of the calcium rich drink to most of the Island?s primary schools.

?It has been in operation for as many years as I can remember. Certainly, it was very strong in the 70s and 80s,? said dairy head Michael Dunkley.

Today Mount Saint Agnes Academy is the only school still using the service. Clearwater Middle School gets regular orders to sell in the school cafeteria and some primary schools will make orders when there is a school promotion on nutrition or milk.

But MSA operates the programme just as it was run when it was launched more than 20 years ago.

Dunkley?s make daily deliveries to the school and teachers hand out the cartons at break time. The programme only runs in the primary division of the school and participation is voluntary. Parents pay each term.

Last term 108 students took part and according to a school spokesman that figure usually rises in the winter months.

Parents decide exactly which of the Dunkley milk formulas they want their children to have. The options include yoghurt and chocolate milk.

?We tried to keep the product as affordable as possible so that parents would feel that they could get their children involved in it,? said Mr. Dunkley. And he said this was always the company?s policy. ?It was aimed at the primary schools, at younger children who needed proper nutrition,? he added.

But Mr. Dunkley said that the programme began to wane in the 1980s and petered out almost entirely in the 1990s.

?I believe it started to change as the schools were less supportive of it for one reason or another and also as nutrition began to take a back seat in our society,? he said. ?Children today are focused on the unhealthy products especially the fruity beverages.?

Government Healthy Schools Coordinator Marie Beach is the author of Government?s Nutrition Policy, which supports and advocates Dunkley?s school milk programme.

Asked why most all Government schools have abandoned it, she said: ?My understanding is that schools found that many children did not drink milk, as they were lactose-intolerant.?

She said storage was another problem as the milk was delivered early and schools did not have refrigerators large enough to hold them until lunch-time. This is a health hazard as milk needs to be kept at least 40 degrees to prevent spoilage.

One school spokesman said the programme was stopped at their private school because it was ?an administration nightmare?.

?We had it about 20 years ago but it ended about 12 years ago and reinstating it has never come up. The milk would be delivered early in the morning and we would have to store it. Or it wouldn?t be delivered on time and the children wouldn?t get it. We had children whose parents had ordered it and they wouldn?t drink it. And we children who saw other children getting it and they would want it but their parents had not paid for it.?

Six out seven parents questioned for this article said they would like to see the programme reintroduced in the primary schools.

The lone dissenter said her daughter is lactose intolerant and drinks no milk at all.

Government nutritionist Cymone Hollis said there?s no need to panic. As long as children are getting sufficient amounts of calcium in their diet, loss of the programme is not a tragedy. She pointed out that the mineral, necessary to form strong healthy bones, is also found in other foods.

Darky leafy vegetables like spinach and kale, tinned salmon and sardines with the bones, are excellent sources. She also recommends soy foods, breads and even orange juice fortified with at least 25 percent calcium (often listed as Ca on food labels) are good alternatives to milk.

In fact Ms Hollis said with juvenile diabetes and obesity on the rise, it is very important that parents give their children low fat and fat free milk.