White House effort could change how nation thinks about food in relation to health; two projects mention rural areas

Biden (Photo by Yuri Gripas/Pool/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)

Today's White House its Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health "is a big deal because it could lead to big changes in how the country thinks about and uses food in relation to physical and mental health," Denise-Marie Ordway writes for Journalist's Resource, a service of the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.

CBS reports that the last such conference, in 1969, "led to a major expansion of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as food stamps, and gave rise to the Women, Infants and Children program, which serves half the babies born in the U.S. by providing their mothers with parenting advice, breastfeeding support and food assistance," CBS reports.

President Biden set the table for the conference with a 40-page strategy for ending hunger and increasing healthy eating and physical activity by 2030. "The Biden administration is counting on a variety of private-sector partnerships to help fund and implement its ambitious goal of ending hunger in America by 2030," CBS reports. Two in the White House fact sheet mention rural areas:

"In the next two years, the National Grocers Association will expand access to full-service grocery stores – grocery stores that stock and sell fresh produce, meat, and dairy, in addition to processed and packaged goods – across the country. It will double the number of retailers offering SNAP online, prioritizing rural areas and areas with low food access, such as agricultural communities." NGA will also build a toolkit to support its members expanding full-service grocery stores into USDA-designated food deserts."

Also, "Over the next seven years, Tyson Foods will invest $255 million into anti-hunger charities to expand access to nutritious protein products, with a focus on rural and underserved areas. It will commit an additional $20 million to provide evidence-based nutrition learning programs for children and their families in the over 100 communities where Tyson operates."

The efforts' five main goals are: expand access to SNAP and electronic benefits transfer in summer; a law allowing Medicaid programs to pay for nutrition counseling, and food as medicine, with Medicare-funded meals tailored to meet medical needs; new packaging and standards to highlight healthy foods; expand the CDC’s physical activity and nutrition program to all states and territories, and create parks and places where people can work out; and provide funding for nutrition science and research.

For journalists, Ordway suggests background reading: "Food Insecurity and Food Deserts in the US: A Research Roundup and Explainer," by her service's senior editor for health, Naseem Miller. He summarizes several studies showing links between health and access to food. "Living in a food desert — a geographic area where there’s a dearth of supermarkets, food retailers or other sources of healthy, affordable food — is associated with higher health care costs and higher rates of chronic diseases," she notes.