Revitalizing The Child Nutrition Act
Between First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move campaign and Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution televised show, our responsibility has become abundantly clear: our collective choices to provide cost-effective school meals has led to this deplorable epidemic of childhood obesity. Luckily, the five year window of opportunity has once again opened for reauthorizing the Child Nutrition Act. This act allows us to revisit the dietary mandates of public school meals, while reassigning standards to benefit children’s health, and reevaluating the method of execution for such designs.
Taking up the reins, Michelle Obama is hallmarking the Child Nutrition Act as the pivotal legislative component in which childhood obesity can be trounced. According to USDA Food and Nutrition Service Administrator Julie Paradis, in U.S. To Improve School Meals and Children’s Health, “The Obama Administration has proposed a historic investment of an additional $10 billion over ten years starting in 2011 that will allow for the improvement of the quality of the School Lunch and School Breakfast Programs, increase the number of kids participating, and ensure schools have the resources they need to make program changes, including training for school food service workers, upgraded kitchen equipment, and additional funding for meal reimbursements for schools that are enhancing nutrition and quality.” Acquiring ample funding and governmental leadership will ensure success of this Child Nutrition Act’s mandate.
Assuming leadership positions in establishing these beneficial standards is the Food Network and Share Our Strength. Ellie Krieger, Dietician and host of Food Network’s “Healthy Appetite” notes in A Change in School Nutrition, “Food Network is trying to make a difference too, working in close partnership with Share Our Strength. In addition to delivering educational television programming and information on the Web about fresh foods and healthy eating, Food Network and Share Our Strength are educating children and families on the importance of fruits and vegetables by establishing Good Food Gardens at inner-city schools and family centers across the country.” These community-based movements to eradicate unhealthy habits are essential to this national paradigm shift in food consumption.
Local community gardens are showcased in the San Diego News Network, Michelle Obama to visit San Diego Thursday, “Michelle Obama will tour a community farm in San Diego Thursday as part of her campaign to end childhood obesity. The first lady will tour the New Roots Community Farm on Chollas Parkway, meet with farmers and volunteers and make remarks, according to the White House.” Neighboring farms’ participation is the instrumental method in which the Child Nutrition Act can be executed, securing organically healthy resources for school meals.
Welding this symbiotic relationship with both community farms and school cafeterias, while eliminating the unhealthy alternatives that food competitors provide, will be a challenging endeavor. Featured in The Atlantic’s Breaking Down the Child Nutrition Act: Q & A, with Kerry Trueman of Eating Liberally and Marion Nestle, professor of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health at New York University, “Competitive foods put schools in a dilemma and in conflict of interest. They make money from competitive foods to help support the school lunch program. But sodas and snacks undermine participation in school meals programs.” In order to combat these obstacles, large-scale financing needs to be provided. Nestle imparts, “Inadequate funding is a big consideration in the Child Nutrition Act (click here for a PDF of the bill). This act provides $4.5 billion over 10 years for school meals. Although this represents a 10-fold increase over previous (2004) funding, it works out to an additional measly six cents per meal—not nearly enough to solve school districts’ financial problems.” Childhood obesity can not be resolved by the government funding alone, private and non-profit financial support will exponentially increase financial security to execute this act.
Make your voice heard by signing Change.org‘s petition: Make Child Nutrition A Priority In 2010. This petition implores: “Your help is needed to urge policymakers to fund the school nutrition programs that families desperately need and can improve children’s health. In this tough economy, American families are struggling to make ends meet. Also, childhood obesity is one of the most pressing health problems facing our nation’s youth. Help improve children’s health today: ask Congress and the Obama Administration to make the renewal of the child nutrition programs a top priority!” Strengthen this movement to revitalize the Child Nutrition Act with your actions: give healthy lives back to our children!
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