Information about the Aspen Ideas Festival is here. I am scheduled for a session, The American Wellness Paradox, currently scheduled from 11:00-11:50 a.m., at the East Lawn Tent. This will be a discussion with senior HHS policy advisor, Calley Means. Here’s the blurb on it: “Americans are spending more than ever on healthcare, supplements, wellness trends, and “clean eating,” yet rates of chronic disease and metabolic illness continue to climb. As skepticism fuels the rise of movements like MAHA, debates over what Americans should eat have become deeply cultural, political, and economic. Two influential voices with sharply different perspectives on nutrition and food science explore how food systems, farming practices, consumer culture, and the wellness industry collided to create one of the defining public health debates of our time.”
by Marion Nestle
Jul
5
2011
Resources for advocacy: school food and ag policy
My San Francisco Chronicle column on food advocacy includes a severely edited list of organizations working on food issues, particularly school food and the farm bill. I thought the entire list might be useful.
Note that information about how to contact government officials appears at the end.
I consider this list preliminary. Please use the Comments to add to it. And pass it along, use, and enjoy!
| Organization | Advocacy resources |
| General | |
| Edible Communities | ~60 Edible magazines throughout U.S. Useful for identifying local food resources |
| Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) | Advocacy and lobbying for a broad range of food and nutrition issues, school food among them. |
| Slow Food USA | Promotes policies favoring slow, as opposed to fast, food |
| Strategic Alliance for Healthy Food and Activity Environments | Promotes policies to improve corporate and government practices that affect food and activity environments in California |
| Community Food Security Coalition | More than 300 organizations working to build sustainable, self-reliant, local and regional food systems, and promote a healthier farm bill. |
| School Food | |
| Background legislation
|
The Healthy, Hunger-free Kids Act of 2010
Proposed nutrition standards for school meals |
| USDA programs | Team Nutrition: supports child nutrition programs through training
Chefs Move to Schools: partners chefs with schools |
| Public Health Advocacy Institute | Promotes use of the legal system to improve school food |
| National Alliance for Nutrition and Activity (NANA) | Lobbies for federal policies and programs to improve school food and activity environments (a project of CSPI) |
| Public Health Law & Policy
|
Offers a policy package with goals and actions for school wellness policies, and a fact sheet on the schools section of its website |
| National Farm to School Network | Promotes connecting farm produce to schools |
| California ProjectLEAN (Leaders Encouraging Activity and Nutrition) | Helps develop school wellness policies and healthier food and activity environments (a joint project of the California Department of Public Health and the Public Health Institute) |
| CANFIT (Communities, Adolescents, Nutrition, Fitness) | Community-based initiatives to improve diet and fitness among low-income, minority adolescents |
| Center For Ecoliteracy | Rethinking School Lunch Guide shows how to incorporate ecological understanding into school meals |
| School Food Focus | Focus: Food Options for Children in Urban Areas |
| One Tray | More direct connection between local farms and school meal programs |
| Better School Food | Community-based connection of school food to health |
| Cook For America | Culinary training to support healthy school lunches cooked from scratch |
| The Lunch Box | Online toolkit with information about healthy lunch options |
| Let’s Move Salad Bars to School | Supports salad bars in schools |
| Project Lunch | Improves Marin County school lunch program |
| Nourish Life | Food and sustainability in schools and communities |
| PEACHSF | How-to guides and resources |
| Farm Bill | |
| Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy | Public policies for food and farming
|
| Food and Water Watch | Bring agricultural policy in line with health and environmental policy |
| National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition | Promotes healthier and more sustainable systems for small- and medium-size farms, farming opportunities, fair competition |
| Organic Trade Association (OTA) | Supports organic food production, large and small |
| Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) | Protect and expand food assistance programs
|
| Environmental Working Group | Exposes inequities in food subsidies; provides data on who gets what |
| PolicyLink | Working to get Healthy Food Financing Initiative into the Farm Bill |
How to contact federal and state government officials
The White House: http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact
Members of Congress http://www.congress.org/congressorg/directory/congdir.tt
- Communicate with members: http://www.congress.org/communicate
- Meet with members: http://www.congress.org/visiting
- Meet with staff: http://www.congress.org/congressional_staff
State officials: http://www.congress.org/legislative_protocol
Local media: http://www.congress.org/congressorg/dbq/media/
