Once it was dib dib dib, now it’s dip dip dip. The Scouts, formed a century ago to tie knots and light campfires without matches, will soon offer badges for healthy eating, sandwich-making and the perfect fruit salad.

Has a movement built on the foundations of the British Empire and muscular Christianity gone soft in its old age? Not at all, says the Scout Association; they are simply moving with the times.

The new badges will be introduced this weekend at the Scouts’ winter camp at Gilwell Park, Essex, where, given the present inclement weather, the old skills of bonfire-making and tent-pitching favoured by Robert Baden-Powell will still be in demand.

Forty new badges can be earned in the largest overhaul of the movement since its founder took a bunch of boys to Brownsea Island to pass on to them the skills he had found so useful in fighting the Boers at the turn of last century. Skateboarding, snowboarding, parascending and riding quad bikes, four of the new badges, were not on the original curriculum, but on the other hand there is no badge now for catching a runaway horse.

Beaver Scouts working towards the healthy eating badge, aimed at six to eight-year-olds, will have to make a fruit salad, two different sandwiches, healthy snacks such as omelettes or homemade meatballs, and list some unhealthy foods. Members will be invited to bring a vegetable to meetings, discuss the assorted produce, and see it turned into vegetable soup. Many, the movement believes, may never have seen a vegetable in its raw state.

Peter Duncan, the Chief Scout and a former Blue Peter presenter, said that the new badges would help to attract more young people to the movement. “The health of young people has always been of the utmost importance to us, and through many of these badges we can help to further encourage young people on the choices they can make to lead a healthy lifestyle. This includes challenging themselves with exciting activities and adventures, meeting new friends throughout the world and creating a real difference in their communities.”

Some badges have been altered to take account of changing fashions. The street sports badge, for example, will now encompass zorbing, in which a participant is pushed down a steep hill inside a large ball.

The first-aid badge is now called the emergency aid badge. Young Beaver Scouts will be taught to recognise dangerous situations and be able to treat cuts and scrapes. Older Scouts will learn how to deal with head injuries and to understand conditions such as epilepsy and meningitis.

There are no plans to introduce a course on recognising an assassination attempt on a head of state. The President of the Maldives was saved from harm a few days ago by the intervention of a Scout.

Nancy Ibrahim, 16, an Explorer Scout from London, said: “I think it’s great that the badges have been updated to include activities that are important to today’s Scouts. We are always hearing that young people aren’t healthy enough and I think it’s really important for everyone to learn what healthy decisions they can make.” The best thing about Scouting, Miss Ibrahim said, was the opportunity to try new adventures. She is one of the 10 per cent of the former boys-only movement who are female.

The Scout Association denies that the revamped badges are an attempt to counter falling popularity. Membership has grown steadily in the past two years to reach nearly half a million people in Britain and 28 million worldwide. They like to describe themselves as the world’s largest peace movement. More likely, they have been casting an eye at the modernisation of the Girl Guides, who can now earn badges for proficiency in safe sex and self-as-sembly furniture, although a theoretical knowledge of the former is apparently all that is required.

Good turn

— During the Boer War Lord Baden Powell served in the Army, and was inspired by local boys who helped with first aid

— In 1907 he held an experimental camp on Brownsea Island, in Dorset, with 20 boys

— The Scout Association has 28 million members in 216 countries, with more than 400,000 in Britain and a waiting list of 30,000

Sources: Times database, the Scout Association

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