USDA School Meal Standards Significantly Increase Consumption of Fruits and Vegetables

The USDA school meal standards have had an impact on low income students as their consumption of fruits and vegetables has increased, says a new finding.

Nearly 32 million students consume school meals every day. In the low income students, half of their daily energy intake is from school meals. Under the earlier guidelines, the school breakfast and lunches were high in sodium and saturated fats and low in fiber and grains. Keeping this mind, the U.S. Department of Agriculture launched new guidelines in 2012.

The new federal standard demanded that schools offer healthier meals to the students. This called for the increased availability of whole grains, fruits and vegetables, requiring the selection of either a fruit or vegetable, increase in portion size of fruits, vegetables, eliminating trans fats and keeping limits on total calorie and sodium levels.

But certain lawmakers criticized the new guidelines saying they lead to an increased wastage of food.  This new finding is the first to examine the school food consumption before and after the standards went into effect and contradict the allegations stating the new standards have made a positive impact on low income school kids and have not let to an increase in wastage of food.

"There is a push from some organizations and lawmakers to weaken the new standards. We hope the findings, which show that students are consuming more fruits and vegetables, will discourage those efforts," said lead author Juliana Cohen, research fellow in the Department of Nutrition at HSPH.

For this study the researcher collected data of 1,030 students in four schools plate wise. The data was collected before 2011 and after 2012. The researcher noticed that there was a 23 percent increase in fruit selection. Though the selection of vegetables remained unchanged, there was an increase in its consumption by 16.2 percent. The consumption of fruits increased post implementation.

Most importantly, the new standard did not result in excessive food waste.  It could be due to increase in portion size of fruits and vegetables the lawmakers assumed that the regulation leads to wastage of food. The authors suggest that the schools must emphasize on quality of food and palatability to cut waste.

"Overall, the new requirements have led to improvements in student diets and have not resulted in increased food waste," adds Dr. Cohen. "Lawmakers should not consider further weakening the school meal standards. The new school meal standards are the strongest implemented by the USDA to date, and the improved dietary intakes will likely have important health implications for children."

The study appears in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.