Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

livingontheland - [Livingontheland] Supplying local produce can foster healthier students--and communities.

livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Healthy soil and sustainable growing

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost@gilanet.com>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] Supplying local produce can foster healthier students--and communities.
  • Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2004 13:16:22 -0700


Supplying local produce can foster healthier students--and communities.
By Robert Gottlieb and Anupama Joshi February 15, 2004
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-op-gottlieb15feb15,1,5802016.story

Robert Gottlieb is professor of urban and environmental policy at Occidental
College. Anupama Joshi is director of the California Farm to School Program,
based at the Center for Food and Justice at Occidental College.

If a student doesn't want to eat the chicken nuggets, pepperoni pizza or
nachos supreme that have become the mainstays of school lunch programs, the
pickings can be pretty slim. Campus vending machines may offer potato chips,
corn nuts or sodas - even though federal rules prohibit their sale during the
lunch hour. Or there might be fast food brought in from off campus. In
California, according to a mail survey of California school district food
service directors, 90% of high schools sell packaged fast foods and 72%
permit advertising of brand-name fast foods and beverages on campus. But kids
hoping for something healthful are often out of luck.

That's no longer the case in Compton. Beginning this month at Willard
Elementary School and in coming months at the 23 other elementary schools in
the Compton Unified School District, students will be able to eat food fresh
from the farm. Salad bars will include different lettuce varieties, carrots,
celery, radishes, broccoli, tomatoes, apples, oranges and, ultimately,
whatever fruits and vegetables are in season, and the produce will come
directly from small to medium-sized farms in the region. Assembly meetings
will be held to introduce the program, and newsletters will be sent to
parents. Students will be encouraged to participate in taste tests to explore
how fresh produce - a tomato, say - really tastes when it's straight from the
farm. Students will visit actual farms, and farmers will visit classrooms.
Schools will institute garden programs to grow their own produce.

In the end, the program's proponents hope children will not only learn to
make healthier food choices but will learn to value the farms and farmers
that produce the food they eat. The boost to local farmers is an added
benefit.

Tracie Thomas, the district's new assistant food service director, knows such
programs can work. Prior to joining the Compton district last year, she
spearheaded a highly successful farm-to-school salad bar program in the Santa
Monica-Malibu School District. And she sees no reason why it shouldn't work
in Compton as well, despite very different demographics. In Compton's
elementary schools, for example, all 18,000 students are eligible for a free
lunch program. In Santa Monica-Malibu, the district of about 13,000 students
feeds approximately 4,000 students in all grades, and only half receive free
or reduced-price lunches.

"I know this is going to be challenging," Thomas said. "But I have no qualms
this can be done."

If she's successful in Compton, Thomas will have shown that there's no reason
why any school district in California can't move toward more healthful food.
Across the country, about 400 school districts in 22 states are participating
in farm-to-school programs. In California, with the advantage of its
year-round growing season, almost 100 schools in 20 districts are serving
local fresh fruit and vegetable choices to their students. And there's a
reason to hope the trend continues: Farm-to-school programs have been shown
to increase fruit and vegetable consumption by more than 40% and also to
decrease food waste.

There are, to be sure, also a number of challenges for the programs. The
price for the fresh produce purchased locally from farms is higher for
certain items. Although the cost in Santa Monica of a full salad-bar meal
including milk, bread and a protein item is less than the cost of a hot meal
like pepperoni pizza (49 cents per meal versus $1.18 per meal, according to
Thomas), other districts have found the costs to be higher for farm-fresh
meals.

Other barriers include purchasing and delivery. Many school food service
buyers prefer the simplicity of buying from a single distributor that then
transports the food to the site.

But the advantages of farm-to-school programs are clear, particularly when
considered in light of the increasing prevalence of overweight children.
Between 1980 and 2000, the rate of overweight kids tripled among school-age
children, from 5% in 1980 to 15% in 2000. U.S. Surgeon General Richard
Carmona has labeled obesity the nation's single biggest health problem.
Although food choice does not represent the only factor influencing this
trend, it is a logical place to intervene.

Much of the focus for intervention so far has been to try to get the fast
food and the junk food out of school vending machines. Several school
districts, including Los Angeles Unified, have passed resolutions banning or
restricting the sale of sodas and junk food on campus. This is an important
step, but it's not the final answer. Kids need to learn how and what to eat.
Providing fresh foods, while at the same time teaching where the foods come
from, can provide lifelong lessons to kids while encouraging and rewarding
small farmers.

Legislative help for such programs may be on the way. This year, Congress
will vote on a "Farm to Cafeteria Projects" bill. The program would provide
one-time grants of up to $100,000 to school districts wanting to institute
farm-to-school programs.

At the state level in California, policy initiatives under discussion include
funding to set up kitchens and gardens in all new schools, providing bonus
reimbursements for school food made with fresh local produce, providing seed
grants to support innovative programs and taxing sodas and junk food in order
to fund more healthful options.

Freeing schools and students from the grip of fast food won't be easy. But,
as districts across the state are demonstrating, it is possible.

Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times






  • [Livingontheland] Supplying local produce can foster healthier students--and communities., Tradingpost, 03/03/2004

Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page