Source: Chris Scott, MEATINGPLACE, 5/20/14
 

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has issued a warning on the effect of the House's fiscal year 2015 Agriculture Appropriations Bill regarding school lunches and how it could affect the health of the nation’s schoolchildren.

He was quickly joined by legislators who voiced the same concerns.

The U.S. Dept. of Agriculture chief believes the bill in its current form would “undermine the effort to provide kids with more nutritious food,” adding that it would be a “major step backwards” for the health of U.S. children at a point where childhood obesity rates are just beginning to level off.

According to a release posted on the committee's website, "Responding to the requests of local schools, the bill includes language requiring USDA to establish a process that will allow schools demonstrating an economic hardship to seek a temporary waiver from compliance with certain nutrition regulations during the 2014-15 school year." The measures are supported by some farm groups and Republican conservatives. They say the new rules drive up food costs and waste food while opponents raise health concerns about the nutritional value of school lunches if districts are allowed to deviate from the standards set forth in the 2010 Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act.

Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), Chairwoman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, also criticized the bill, saying, "I am strongly opposed to the effort in the House agriculture appropriations bill to ... [unwind] the landmark Child Nutrition law, which was also passed with bipartisan majorities, by undermining efforts to improve the health of school children. ... When Congress passes laws with strong bipartisan majorities, the appropriations bills must reflect the will of Congress and the letter and the spirit of those laws.”

More than 90 percent of schools say they have been able to successfully implement school nutrition standards and studies indicate that these efforts are working to slow childhood obesity, Vilsack noted. The House is expected to vote on the measure sometime this week.

Meanwhile, the USDA's Food and Nutrition Service echoed the theme of greater flexibility for school districts by expanding considerably the length of time that some districts have to implement the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Acts' requirements on whole-grain foods.

In the last year, grassroots discontent over the requirements of the 2010 legislation has been growing, with students complaining that they are not getting enough food, complaining about the palatability of what they do get, and districts pointing out huge increases in food waste. Several districts have withdrawn from the National School Lunch Program altogether, saying that so many kids have stopped buying lunch that their participation is costing them money.

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