Brazil: working towards healthy communities

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Child Nutrition in Canada Growing Together
Cultivating Food Security in Canada Winnipeg
October 15, 2004 Debbie Field, FoodShare Toronto
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What do we want for our children?What would a
comprehensive child nutrition policy consist of?

• A variety of government policies that govern what
  and how children access healthy food in society
  in general, at home and at school
• student nutrition programs -- often called school
  feeding programs -- breakfast, lunch and snack
  programs mostly at schools but some in the
  community. These programs can be the cornerstone
  of a school based educational and behavioural
  change process.

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First Steps-- please turn to the person next to
you and ask them

• How did/do children eat
• in Canadian society?
• at school?
• 100 years ago?
• When you were a child?
• How would you like them to eat in the future?

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Reporting Back

• Please introduce yourself, and describe your
  involvement, if any with child nutrition or
  student nutrition programs
• Then please tell us what your partner said about
  how children ate and should eat in the future.

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How are we doing in Canada?

• No conscious policies that govern what and how
  children access healthy food in society, at home
  and at school
• A myriad of grass roots, mostly unregulated
  student nutrition programs -- breakfast, lunch
  and snack programs at school and in the
  community
• a few provinces and cities support these
  programs with funds and policies.

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So what could we do?

• Organize School and community based programs
• Advocate for government (at all three levels)
  funding and regulation for programs -- the
  daycare model
• Develop integrated school programming -- actual
  food, modeling healthy eating, physical activity,
  curriculum.
• Promote policies against pop in schools
• Advocate for government policies that regulate
  advertising and implement long term policies to
  deal with the whole childs experience of food --
  at home, in the marketplace, at school.

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So what could we do?

• Organize School and community based programs

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Why would we have student nutrition programs?
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Two groups of people in our society have any
control over how our children eat -- parents and
the fast food industry. Student nutrition
programs help parents reclaim control over what
our kids eat from the fast food industry. Wally
Seccombe
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Canadian Student Nutrition History 1950 Federal
Cabinet rejects funding universal student
nutrition programs 1985-90 Programs begin
emerging from the grass roots 1988-1995 BC,Saskat
chewan, Quebec, New Foundland, Ontario begin some
funding of programs distributed both
directly(BC Ministry of Education) or via
community organizations (CHEP in
Saskatoon) 1990 City of Toronto begins
funding programs -- 180,000 in that year for
8 pilots and now 2.5 million a year 400
programs, 350 schools, 70,000 kids a
day 1992 Canadian Living Magazine founds
Breakfast for Learning Foundation 1993 Only
National Symposium on Student Nutrition Programs
with representatives from each
province 1997 David Hay report suggests to
Health Canada that student nutrition programs
are not good social policy to eliminate child
poverty, once more stopping Federal
movement 1998-2004 Programs continue to grow.
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The U.S. ModelDepartment of Agriculture
Surplus Food -- New Deal
Pros and Cons of the U.S. Approach
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Salad Bar project
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Saskatoon Collective Kitchens
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Every week a small army of volunteers gathers to
pack hundreds of Good Food Boxes in both our
cities.
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People of all ages and cultures learn to work
together through community gardening,
strengthening our neighbourhoods
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Composting hundreds of kilograms of vegetable
waste are composted every week at Field To
Table Centre
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So what could we do?

• Advocate for government (at all three levels)
  funding and regulation for programs -- the
  daycare model

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Toronto Kitchen Incubator and Field to Table
Catering
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So what could we do?

• Develop integrated school programming -- actual
  food, modeling healthy eating, physical activity,
  curriculum.

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I come to this movement as a mother worried
about how my children were eating at school..
..and now FoodShare is the host of the Toronto
Partners for Student Nutrition.
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So what could we do?

• Promote policies against pop in schools.

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Focus On Food Youth Training Employment Program
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So what could we do?

• Advocate for government policies that regulate
  advertising and implement long term policies to
  deal with the whole childs experience of food --
  at home, in the marketplace, at school.

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We are pioneers of a new and powerful
social movement.