Healthy, Hunger - Free Kids Act
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The Healthy, Hunger-Free kids Act will commit $ 4.5 billion dollars into child nutrition program over the next decade. This bill involves Department of Agriculture setting up a new set of dietary guidelines using scientific based nutrition standard. This bill will be the starting line to fight against childhood hunger while at the same time addressing childhood obesity epidemic. The bill will increases the cost of school lunch by 6 cents per children while making sure more fresh food is available instead of junk food.
The bill was unanimously passed the Senates in August but has then stalled just before the midterm election as members worried about the push to build more garden and feed children will not sit too well in this economic downturn. Objection is also heard from the anti-Hunger Advocates as the $ 4.5 billion dollar was taken from Federal food Stamp Program. The bill was finally passed on December 1.
"It is about time we gave our children the school lunch they deserve" said Josh Viertel President of Slow food USA. Our food system is broken and we know it when the food we feed our children will develop diabetes in one third of children population and when the childhood obesity is at all-time high. For the past two years, Slow Food has been campaigning with more than 160,000 members joining "Time for Lunch" campaign. This bill helps local farmer's family who supply fresh produce for school lunch through Farm to School Program.
What people do not realize is that there are a lot of children who relays on their lunch as their main meal of the day. The lack of proper nourishment from proper diet they get from lunch will affect their brain growth which definitely affects their learning rate. The bill will allow school in high poverty area to offer free meals to their students without collecting paper applications, which hopefully will expand across to more children while reducing administration burdens on school. In some cases, dinner will also be provided.
The main point from this act is actually to reduce the growing childhood obesity rates in old United States of America. Controlling the amount of calorie intakes that was served in student's lunch, the government hopes that this bill will lower the obesity childhood rates which is around 1 obesity cases from every three children. Food sold from vending machine will now be regulated so that no candy bar or high sugar sodas are allowed to be sold from school vending machine. On some cases, bake sales and fundraising will also be limited to decrease the chances of children having access to eat more unhealthy food. Although pizza and burger will still be sold in cafeteria, new healthier option will be offered.
The future of our countries relies solely on our young generation. It is our duties to provide the proper nutrition for our children. Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act will see to the nourishment provided for our young generation.
Article Source: Articlelogy.com
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