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White House Shares New National Strategy to End Hunger

White House officials released a new national strategy on hunger, nutrition, and health for the first time in more than 50 years

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On October 6, American University’s Department of Health Studies hosted a virtual discussion, The Path Forward: White House Conference on Hunger and Nutrition. More than 400 people attended, including students, faculty and staff, nutrition and health professionals, and advocates from across the country.   

Laura Carroll from the White House Domestic Policy Council began the presentation with a detailed overview of the Biden-Harris administration’s bold new national strategy to end hunger in America and increase healthy eating and physical activity by 2030. Afterwards, AU’s Margo Wootan (adjunct faculty member and president of MXG Strategies) moderated a panel featuring Brian Dittmeier from National WIC Association, Umailla Fatima from UnidosUS, and Jason Gromley from Share Our Strength.

White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health

The White House officially announced the new initiative on September 28. Working across the government, the Biden-Harris administration developed a whole-of-government approach to eliminate health disparities, end hunger, and reduce diet-related disease. It was the first White House conference on hunger since 1968 when former President Richard Nixon convened a conference that led to Congress creating programs like the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC), which has helped millions of American families live healthier lives.  

It was fitting that AU’s Department of Health Studies hosted the event, says Stacey Snelling, Health Studies professor and department chair. The department has a deep commitment to translating science into policy to promote the nation’s health and well-being. “The new national strategy to end hunger and increase healthy eating and exercise, embodies the role of public health and nutrition education, which are central to the work of our department. We all must eat to live, the question is, how do we build a food system in which individuals and communities have access to healthy, affordable food?”  

Five Pillars

Carroll began with a detailed snapshot of the White House’s ambitious strategy. Just a few of the highlights include expanded school meals, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), summer food programs for kids, sodium reduction targets for food companies, additional fruit and vegetable benefits for low-income families, improvements to food labeling, and leveraging government purchasing power to improve healthy food access.  

The initiative is anchored around five pillars that will serve as a roadmap ahead:

  1. Improving food access and affordability, including by advancing economic security; increasing access to free and nourishing school meals; providing access to meals to more children during summer; and expanding Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) eligibility to more underserved populations;
  2. Integrating nutrition and health, including by working with Congress to pilot coverage of medically tailored meals in Medicare; testing Medicaid coverage of nutrition education and other nutrition supports through demonstration projects; and expanding Medicaid and Medicare beneficiaries’ access to nutrition and obesity counseling. 
  3. Empowering all consumers to make and have access to healthy choices, including by developing front-of-package labeling for food packages; updating the nutrition criteria for the “healthy” claim on packaged food; expanding incentives for fruits and vegetables in SNAP; facilitating sodium reduction in the food supply by issuing longer-term, voluntary sodium targets for industry; and assessing additional steps to reduce added sugar consumption, including potential voluntary targets;
  4. Supporting physical activity for all, including by expanding the US Department of Health and Human Services’ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) State Physical Activity and Nutrition Program to all states and territories; investing in efforts to connect people to parks and other outdoor spaces; and funding regular updates to and promotion of the Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans; and 
  5. Enhancing nutrition and food security research, including by bolstering funding to improve metrics, data collection, and research to inform nutrition and food security policy, particularly on issues of equity and access; and implementing a vision for advancing nutrition science.

What’s Next: The Path Forward 

After Carroll’s presentation, the panel reinforced the White House message that the national strategy cannot succeed without the support of all segments of society. They stressed that individuals, researchers, health professionals, advocacy organizations, and food companies need to work together to ensure this plan gets implemented to eliminate hunger and health disparities and support healthy eating.

“By drawing the connection to chronic diet-related conditions, and having the president vocalize that as a commitment, really paints the pictures towards our long-term and national security,” said Brian Dittmeier from National WIC Association, who also stressed the shift from treatment to prevention. Dittmeier is particularly excited about the prospect of a USDA review of the WIC food packages, which promises to be a major step forward in healthier eating and increasing access to nutritious foods for the nation’s most vulnerable. “We will see a new generation with healthier outcomes,” he said.

Umailla Fatima from UnidosUS, the nation's largest Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization, said she was pleased to see the administration looking at food and nutrition in a holistic way that stresses the social determinants of health, such as poverty, housing, and race and ethnicity—and how they intersect with these issues of food insecurity. UnidosUS is particularly focused on several key recommendations that they believe will be effective in addressing structural vulnerabilities and removing barriers to healthy food. These policies will improve transportation options, improve access to healthy and nutritious food in historically underserved communities, and create nutrition education that is grounded in cultural understanding and translated into different languages.

Jason Gromley from Share Our Strength, said his organization was grateful that the administration chose to focus so much on kids, particularly in expanding the Child Tax Credit, which, he says, is instrumental in ending hunger for children and families. Expanding the eligibility for school meals and providing meals during summer months when they are not in school are key to helping feed vulnerable children, he said. Finally, the idea of interagency cooperation would give families one access point to all these programs, which “could be the most transformational thing, if done right.”

Wootan adds that “Students, faculty and other AU community members can support a healthier food system and help reduce hunger and health disparities by staying informed and engaged. One option is to follow an organizations like National WIC Association, UnidosUS, and Share Our Strength on social media and respond to their calls to action to email USDA, the FDA, or Congress in support of food and nutrition policies. It is easier than you think, taking just minutes to act. I have seen it influence policymakers time and time again.”

For More Information 

“The AU webinar added to the momentum and enthusiasm coming out of the White House Conference. The department continues to offer timely and important conversations and provide continuing education opportunities to its students, alumni, and community partners across the United States,” says Snelling. For more information about Department of Health Studies events, visit the Health department's website

 For more information about the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, visit the White House website.