‘Time to step up to the plate’
HEALTHY FOOD: Advocates push provinces to commit to national school nutrition strategy
Now is the time for B.C. and other provinces to “step up to the plate” and commit to healthy food in schools, advocates say.
With Canada’s federal, provincial and territorial health ministers meeting in Vancouver this week, members of Canada’s Coalition for Healthy School Food were in town trying to get the ministers to consider the importance of healthy food programs.
The issue is more important than ever in a time of soaring prices at the grocery store, said Sasha McNicoll, the Toronto-based co-ordinator of the Coalition for Healthy School Food.
“Canada is one of the only industrialized countries that doesn’t have a national school food program,” McNicoll said.
“It’s so important to focus on children because it’s much easier to instil healthy behaviours in a child than it is to change unhealthy ones in an adult.”
A successful program, she said, would not only feed children, but also teach them about the importance of nutrition and health.
Brent Mansfield, director of the B.C. Food Systems Network, said: “For Canada not to have a national school food program that supports the health of students, it’s just such a missed opportunity.”
A decade ago, “B.C. was an early leader in Canada on funding and planning for healthy food in schools,” Mansfield said.
In 2006, the B.C. education ministry established Community-LINK (Learning Includes Nutrition and Knowledge), a program that still provides annual funding for meal programs and counselling at B.C. schools.
“Ten years ago, Community-LINK was a big step. And we think now is the time for B.C., with others, to take it to another level,” Mansfield said.
In recent years, Alberta, Ontario, Newfoundland and Nova Scotia have implemented new programs, Mansfield said, and now “B.C. has an opportunity to catch up to other provinces ... They have to step up to the plate and play their part.”
Mansfield, a former Vancouver elementary school teacher, said although many local school boards do their best, “it’s such a patchwork of programs ... There’s so many opportunities for folks to fall through the cracks.”
Last year, Mansfield was part of B.C.’s Healthy Eating Strategy Leadership Council, which forwarded a recommendation to the government to improve access to healthy food in schools.
The council recommended collaboration among national, provincial and municipal authorities to establish a “cost-shared universal healthy school food program.”
Such a program would require a significant financial commitment, Mansfield said, but considering the long-term health implications, “it’s a smart investment.”
B.C. health ministry spokesman Stephen May said a provincial healthy eating strategy is under development.
In an email, May said the ministry invests in healthy eating in schools through programs such as Farm to School B.C., which “increases access (to) healthy, local food in schools and reaches 120 public, independent and First Nations schools in the province.”
May said: “We have recognized a need for greater access to healthy food for students while at school and that children who eat well-balanced healthy meals have better education outcomes and better physical and mental health.”