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Home > Events > Conferences > Past Sessions > Food Policy in the Land of Plenty |
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Food Policy in the Land of Plenty:
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Pepe Garcia, President of the MCC Board of Directors, welcomed everyone to the session by discussing the significance of combining direct service with public policy, research, education, and advocacy. He noted that MCC was recently chosen by the USDA as one of nineteen organizations nationwide to participate in the Food Stamp Participation Project. With the support of the USDA and Mazon, MCC conducts food stamp outreach and hunger advocacy, and provides nutrition information and counseling to people in Delaware and Montgomery counties. By participating in these projects, organizations like MCC are working on the front line to get information on food assistance programs and nutrition to the people who need it most.
Pepe introduced the Moderator, John Chandler, the new Acting Regional Administrator for the Mid-Atlantic Region of the United States Department of Agriculture's Food and Nutrition Service (FNS). John expressed his excitement about working with MCC, and congratulated all those who successfully advocated for the end of the Pennsylvania lifetime ban on TANF and Food Stamp eligibiltiy for people with previous felony drug convictions. John reported that there are over 300,000 deaths a year in the United States caused by obesity, and 34% of adults are overweight, while an additional 31% are obese. The FNS is working on a number of programs to combat obesity, such as changing the school environment to encourage healthy eating, promoting the benefits of fresh fruits and vegetables, and providing WIC demonstration grants to ensure healthy eating among mothers and young children.
It Takes More Than Willpower:
Promising Approaches For Addressing Nutrition and Obesity
Margo Wooten, Center for Science in the Public Interest.
Margo Wooten, Director of Nutrition Policy at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, delivered the keynote address. According to Margo, the socio-cultural environment in the U.S. does not support healthy lifestyles. The food industry sepnds more than $26 billion a year in advertising, using only 2% of it for nutritious foods. Sugary, fatty food is ubiquitous and is relatively inexpensive. We eat out more than in the past, serving sizes at restaurants have increased, and soda has become our national beverage. Our levels of physical activity have declined and physical education classes are less frequently offered at schools. Kids no longer walk or bike to school, and Americans are increasingly sedentary, watching on average three to four hours of television per day.
Margo asserted that our eating norms and choices are unhealthy by default, not by decision. We have mistakenly focused all of our energy in the fight against obesity on promoting personal responsibility and education without adequately addressing the systemic problems. In her opinion, we must change our focus to policy reform and to the accessibility of health choices. Dr. Wootan shared some of the solutions that could change the food environment.
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Dr. Wootan concluded by emphasizing the importance of federal and state funding to alter the food environment in America. With awareness, policy change, and successful programs, we can make healthy, nutritional choices the norm.
Pennsylvania Nutrition & Anti-Hunger Advocacy
Berry Friesen, Pennsylvania Hunger Action Center
Berry Friesen began by quoting Douglas Bersoff's shocking op-ed in the Washington Post, "we are feeding the poor as if they as starving." Bersoff, a professor at the University of Maryland, argued that the rising level of obesity among the low-income population is due to federal programs giving people an insurmountable amount of food.
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Berry described U.S. public food programs and explored the current threats many of them face. Berry highlighted the nutrition education component of the National Food Stamp Program, which is in jeopardy of elimination. Berry praised the state of Pennsylvania for being one of the few states to utilize food banks, pantries, and other alternative methods to offer nutritional education to low-income populations.
Berry critiqued the USDA's attempt to modify the National School Lunch program. In an effort to establish an effective application procedure, the USDA began to audit applications and call parents to verify information, a policy that has led to more problems in the system and has built barriers to accessing the program itself. Berry gave a risk-benefit analysis of this approach, and concluded that this method is more harmful than helpful because eligible, rather than ineligible families, tend to be squeezed out.
After providing an in-depth analysis of the critical steps needed to enhance food services and practices in the United States and in Pennsylvania, Berry concluded by stating that the initial steps to transforming legislation, policies, and programs begins with open dialogue and discussion that can be fostered through sessions such as the one today.
The Hunger & Obesity Paradox
Lynn Parker, Food Research and Action Center
Lynn Parker examined the hunger and obesity paradox - the coexistence of hunger and obesity within a family - and argued that proposals to cut federal food programs are unsubstantiated and threaten the vitality of families' livelihood and health. Although federal nutrition programs have been widely successful, there has been a move toward eliminating many of these programs that help to provide nutritionally sound diets for children and families. The underlying assumptions behind these propositions are that poor people are obese, and hunger does not exist.
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Obesity has severe consequences, and may co-exist with hunger or food insecurity. Today, hunger has a different face: families may not experience hunger on a daily basis, but many grapple several times a month with limited resources. As a result, families resort to eating less or eating in irregular spurts, reducing the quantity and quality of food, or skipping meals altogether. Lynn reported that 13 million children and 12 million families experience hunger every year.
The adverse consequences of nutritionally poor diets are: impaired health status, lower cognitive abilities and self-esteem, disciplinary problems, depression, and anxiety in adults; and hypertension and chronic disease in children. Poor diet is a leading cause of premature death among adults. These unhealthy outcomes are further agitated by poor people's inability to access proper healthcare and screenings, and a lack of grocery stores where they can buy fresh, healthy fruits and vegetables. Moreover, poor children's health is adversely affected by not engaging in adequate amounts of physical activity due to the lack of safe after school activities and programs.
A family can be both obese and experience bouts of food insecurity because during lean times they are dependant upon high-caloric foods. Mothers tend to sacrifice, and suffer significantly by minimizing the quantity and quality of their own food intake for that of their children. Naturally, the children are affected and began to adapt the same poor eating habits that they observe.
Lynn's main arguments against the proposed cuts of federal food programs were:
Exploring The Food & Nutrition Safety Net
Karen Wilson, Greater Philadelphia Coalition Against Hunger.
Karen Wilson, Director of the Greater Philadelphia Coalition Against Hunger, presented on the landscape of anti-hunger work in Pennsylvania and discussed four federal nutrition programs: Food Stamps, WIC, the Summer Food Program, and the School Lunch and Breakfast Programs.
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Karen began by presenting a diagram that outlined the relationships between federal and local food programs, the "front line" food providers (such as food cupboards and soup kitchens), and big food providers (such as Greater Philadelphia Food Bank and Philabundance, and faith-based jurisdictions). She continued by giving the historical background of federal food assistance, tracing the first time the government fed people in the 1930s during the Depression through the War on Poverty in the 1960s that almost ended hunger in America, to the devastating cutbacks during the Reagan administration, and the subsequent alarming rise in hunger in the 80s and 90s.
Karen gave up-to-date information on federal food programs. In the 1980s and 1990s, the application for food stamps was complicated, but the process has since been simplified. She reminded the audience that there is no time limit for receiving food stamps (unlike TANF); working people are eligible for food stamps; and people with disabilities, who are homebound, or who have inflexible work schedules, can schedule phone interviews instead of the mandatory face-to-face appointments with the County Assistance Office. Other new rules also make food stamps more accessible: you can have a car and up to $2,000 in the bank and still be eligible, and children of immigrants are eligible, no matter the immigration status of their parents (parents are not required to provide INS documentation).
The WIC program in Philadelphia is meeting its caseload, and they have a new computer system that is much more efficient than the previous system. They are also offering infant feeding classes. Karen described in detail the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) that provides food for child care and family child care centers, as well as suppers for after-school programs in Pennsylvania. For more information on any of these programs, Karen encouraged the audience to contact the appropriate agencies or the Greater Philadelphia Coalition Against Hunger at 215-430-0555.
Hunger & Dignity Among Women in Philadelphia
Mariana Chilton, Drexel University School of Public Health.
Mariana Chilton, Assistant Professor at Drexel University School of Public Health, presented on hunger and dignity among women in Philadelphia. She reported on her findings from focus groups and interviews with women in Philadelphia who had used food cupboards in the past. Mariana's main message was that hunger is not just about food - it is about health, politics, and emotions. In the US, households run by women, and African American and Hispanic households, are up to twice as likely to experience food insecurity as male-headed or white households.
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Article 25 of the United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that "Everyone has a right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing medical care and necessary social services..." Dr. Chilton used this article as a framework for discussing adequate food as part of a greater system of mutually-dependent human rights. She displayed a diagram of family health issues that included health and health care, food/nutrition, housing, and education and employment to show the interdependence of each of these components.
Mariana shared from her research the personal stories of women whose lives were affected by hunger. They not only struggled with hunger of the body, but hunger of the mind. They suffered from depression and stress as a result of violence, poverty, and hunger in their lives. Their experience of hunger is just one of many stresses in their lives. The daily assaults on their dignity have a devastating impact on their health. Mariana argued that we must work to change the entire system of oppression that affects the poor and disenfranchised in our society.
Obesity: Links to Maternal and Infant Health
Shiriki Kumanyika, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.
Shiriki Kumanyika raised questions about preexisting maternal and prenatal variables and their correlation with obesity later in childhood. She presented findings from several studies with extensive analysis and interpretations.
Shiriki reported findings from Nutrition Today Matters Tomorrow that healthy weight before and during pregnancy improves the likelihood of favorable reproductive outcomes. She encouraged mothers to gain healthy amounts of weight and remain active during their pregnancy, but work to gradually lose the weight through diet and physical activity during the postpartum period. Data indicated that children born to overweight mothers were more inclined to be overweight themselves, so maternal weight management is critical to healthy children. In looking closer at the occurrences of obesity among ethnic groups, African-American and Mexican-American women showed the greatest propensity for overweight, which explains the higher percentages of obesity among African-American and Mexican American children, particularly girls.
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The Black Women's Health Study, a mailed questionnaire, found that childbearing had a direct link to obesity, particularly with each subsequent birth. Women who had more babies gained and retained more weight in comparison to women with a single birth.
Shiriki shared another study of 27,899 eligible full-term subjects born between 1959 and 1965 that examined infant weight gain and childhood overweight status. Reported findings showed that for each increase of 100g/month, risk for overweight seven years later was 38% higher. Children who experienced rapid weight gain during the first four months of life had an increased risk of overweight status later on.
Overall, Dr. Kumanyika concluded that predisposing factors to obesity may be in place long before obesity is evident. Rapid weight gain in infancy may be a risk factor for childhood obesity and obesity later on in life. Clearly, maternal obesity is problematic for positive birth outcomes and may be aggravated by pregnancy weight gain. In addition, predisposition may be exacerbated by unfavorable environmental circumstances.
Improving Infant Feeding Practices
Diane Spatz, University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing.
Diane Spatz discussed methods needed to improve infant feeding practices while, primarily focusing on the importance of breastfeeding. She presented evidence-based research concerning breastfeeding, and translated it to clinical practices. Diane stressed that the key steps to establishing better clinical breastfeeding practices depends on the adequate training of healthcare professionals.
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According to Spatz, during 2003, 73% of the infants in the NICU at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia had mothers who were pumping or breastfeeding, which can be attributed to an institutional transformation and training breastfeeding resource nurses. The Shannon Award pilot study, a precursor to the current study Diane is conducting at Johns Hopkins University, achieved a breastfeeding rate of 45% at six months postpartum among low-income African American women using a community health nurse/peer counselor model designed to enhance mothers' social support. Dr. Spatz concluded her discussion by stating that ultimately, changing breastfeeding practices in the United States will require societal, cultural, and institutional changes.
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