How Biden’s 5 Pillars of Hunger Strategy Will Show Up on Your Operation
More than four in 10 American have high blood pressure, which is directly correlated to the leading causes of death for Americans: heart disease and stroke. That’s according to new research from National Center for Health Statistics.
To reduce such diet-related diseases and end hunger by 2030, President Biden on Tuesday announced a package, National Strategy on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, that he says creates a “pathway” to:
• Free school meals for all students
• Expand Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)
• Develop front-of-package nutrition labels
• Implement a Medicare test of “food as medicine”
More News to Come
The 44-page strategy was released ahead of Wednesday’s White House hunger conference where Biden and USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack, among others, will speak.
According to the White House release, the national strategy will focus on five primary pillars:
1. Improve food access and affordability
2. Integrate nutrition and health
3. Empower all consumers to make and have access to healthy choices
4. Support physical activity for all
5. Enhance nutrition and food security research
Some of the White House proposals will require congressional action, such as expanding school nutrition programs. Others can be undertaken at the agency level, such as FDA development of front-of-package labels and guidelines to reduce sodium and, potentially, added sugars in foods.
However, the Biden administration says the federal government cannot meet this 2030 goal alone.
In the strategy outline, the White House called upon the private sector to also implement the five pillars.
How This Announcement Will Impact Ag
Some ways this health legislation might be implemented on your operation come in the form of:
• A congressional push for $15 per hour minimum wage
• New policies that increase worker power and rights to bargain, including, “workers who grow, produce, and process our food…”
• EPA and USDA’s yet to be announced “whole-of government” strategy for reducing food loss and waste.
• USDA NIFA’s research to determine the “links between human health and soil health” from a soil management practice standpoint.
The Biden administration says this strategy was developed based on “robust” stakeholder engagement through web forums and listening sessions, which were open to agriculture groups.
But this isn’t the first strategy to address health and hunger.
A Page from History Books
The National Strategy on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health comes more than 50 years after the White House hosted an event on food insecurity.
The last food insecurity conference at the White House was in the Nixon administration. The 1969 hunger conference and its many recommendations influenced U.S. nutrition policy for the rest of the century.
Key accomplishments include expansion of the food stamp and school lunch programs, authorization of WIC and creation of the dietary guidelines for Americans.
“The last conference was a critical moment in our history, and I have no doubt we’ll look back on this year’s conference with the same historic lens,” Vilsack says.
More on policy:
White House to Host First Hunger, Nutrition and Health Address in More Than 50 Years
EPA: Glyphosate Can Still be Used Through 2026
5 Conservation Needs to be Met in Farm Bill 2023
