President Signs Child Nutrition Bill

On Monday, President Obama signed a broad overhaul of child nutrition standards that will encourage better eating habits. The $4.5 billion bill will give the federal government more authority to set standards for the food sold at schools.

The bill also will give money to poor areas to subsidize meals, and also require schools to follow USDA’s health guidelines. The higher cost of incorporating more fruits and vegetables will be offset by increasing the reimbursement rate for school lunches.

In addition, the bill:

• Gives USDA the authority to set nutritional standards for all foods regularly sold in schools during the school day, including vending machines, the “a la carte” lunch lines, and school stores.
• Provides additional funding to schools that meet updated nutritional standards for federally subsidized lunches.
• Helps communities establish local farm to school networks, create school gardens, and ensures that more local foods are used in the school setting.
• Builds on USDA work to improve nutritional quality of commodity foods that schools receive from USDA and use in their breakfast and lunch programs.
• Expands access to drinking water in schools, particularly during meal times.
• Sets basic standards for school wellness policies, including goals for nutrition promotion and education and physical activity, while still permitting local flexibility to tailor the policies to their particular needs.
• Promotes nutrition and wellness in child care settings through the federally subsidized Child and Adult Care Food Program.
• Expands support for breastfeeding through the WIC program.
• Increases the number of eligible children enrolled in school meal programs by approximately 115,000 students by using Medicaid data to directly certify children who meet income requirements.
• Helps certify an average additional 4,500 students per year to receive school meals by setting benchmarks for states to improve the certification process.
• Allows more universal meal access for eligible students in high poverty communities by eliminating paper applications and using census data to determine school-wide income eligibility.
• Expands USDA authority to support meals served to at-risk children in afterschool programs.
• Requires school districts to be audited every three years to improve compliance with nutritional standards.
• Requires schools to make information more readily available to parents about the nutritional quality of meals.
• Includes provisions to ensure the safety of school foods, like improving recall procedures and extending hazard analysis and food safety requirements for school meals throughout the campus.
• Provides training and technical assistance for school food service providers.